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KINGS OF WEALTH 

VS. 

THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 



A TREATISE ON POLITICAL-ECONOMIC 
CONDITIONS AS THEY EXIST IN THE 
UNITED STATES TO-DAY, WITH A 
REMEDY FOR IMPROVING THEM 

BY 

EDWARD N. OLLY 

AUTHOR OF ''MUTUAL OWNERSHIP VS. PRIVATE MONOPOLY,' 
"limitation OF WEALTH," ETC. 



Dear Mr. Oily : 






"I must say 


I am very much | 


impressed with 


your 


theory." 


{Mayor) 


W. 


J.IGaynor. 



Copyright, 1913, by Edward N. Olly 



NEW YORK 
J. S. OGILVIE PUBLISHING COMPANY 

57 Rose Street 



.06 



©CI.A358675 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGI 

FOREWORD 7 

PROPOSED LAW OF LIMITED OWNERSHIP ii 

CHAPTER I.— UNLIMITED PRIVATE PROP- 
ERTY—A PREMIUM ON GREED. 
Dame Fortune and a Rag Picker. — Might of Greed. 
— Modern Banker and Marcus Crassus. — Valued In^ 
stitution of Private Property. — Rights of Men are 
Limited. — Property Rights are Unlimited. — Uncle 
Sara Unnatural Parent. — Grab-It-AU Monstrosities. 
—Premium on Greed. — Reign of Millionairism 15 

CHAPTER II.— NATION'S WEALTH LIMITED, 
PRIVATE PROPERTY UNLIMITED. 
Wealth vs. Poverty.— Wealth Is Not Gold.— Mil- 
lionaires Own Wealth, Not Currency. — National 
Wealth Is Limited. — Possibilities Are Limitless. — 
Wealth Is Limited by Purchasing Power of the 
People. — Prosperity Depends on Purchasing Power 
of the People. — Wealth of Robinson Crusoe. — Ob- 
ject Lesson from Crusoe's Island 51 

CHAPTER III.— UNLIMITED UNEARNED PROF- 
ITS, UNLIMITED EVIL. 
Equitable Distribution. Basis of Prosperity. — Two 
Channels of Distribution of Wealth. — Profitable Fac- 
tory of Master Gwynne. — Exploitation of Two Sets 
of Workers. — Should Profits Be Abolished? — Profits 
on Limited Private Property Are Justifiable. — 
Limited Inheritance Is Also Justifiable. — Necessary 
Evil Need Not Become Unlimited Evil. — American 
Bacchanalia of Profit-Gathering. — Profits of a Cap- 
italist Are Always Unearned. — Workers Are Ex- 
cluded from Participation in Profits. — Let Everyone 
Get What He Deserves 48 

3 



5j CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHAPTER IV.— PRIVATE MONOPOLY, FOE TO 
CIVILIZATION. 
Enigma of Progress and Poverty. — Marvels of Mod- 
ern Production. — Production Cheaper, Prices Artifi- 
cially Higher. — A Reactionary Force Stops Progress 
of Civilization. — Americans Are Paying Millions in 
Tribute. — Who Is the Enemy? — Ceaseless Flow of 
Tribute to Monopolists. — Trusts Are Advance 
Guards of Civilization. — The Souls of Trusts Are 
Guilty. — Monopolistic Shareholding Illustrated. — To- 
bacco, Railroad and Steel Kings. — Trust Owners Are 
XXth Century Machiavellis. — The Remarkable Beef 
Autocrat. — Cold Storage Trust Cornering Perish- 
able Food. — Private Refrigerating Car Monopoly.-— 
Butter and Egg Board. — Milk Trust Taxing Ameri- 
can Babies. — Prices Doubled and Trebled by the 
Trusts. — Modern Holocaust of Coffee. — Monopo- 
lized Railroads, Allies of Trusts. — Dry Goods Trust 
Denouncing Its Brethren. — Industrial Millionairism 
Is Undesirable 72 

CHAPTER v.— UNEMPLOYMENT, QUESTION OF 
LIFE OR DEATH FOR MILLIONS. 
Unemployment Is Unknown Among Animals and 
Savaris. — Capital and Labor, Unnatural Twins. — 
Civilization Begets Unemployment. — Pilgrim Fa- 
thers, Vanguard of the Unemployed. — Artificial 
Overcrowding Causes Unemployment. — Does Ma- 
chinery Create Unemployment? — Inventions Do Not 
Benefit Majority of the People. — Machines Benefit 
Their Owners.^ — Monopolized Machinery Is Harm- 
ing the People. — Unemployment Must Increase 
Enormously. — Rockefeller's Remedy for Unemploy- 
ment. — Napoleonic Solution of the Problem of Un- 
employment. — Demand for Bread and Games by 
Roman Unemployed. — Egyptian Pyramid Builders. — 
Summary of the Causes and the Remedy no 

CHAPTER VI.— NATURE'S UNIVERSAL LAW OF 
LIMITATION. 
Harmony of the Whole Is Ultimate Aim of Every- 
thing. — Law^ of Limitation Exemplified in Human 
Body. — Limited Ownership Preserved in a Family. — 
Beneficial Homestead Act. — Industrial Policy of Go- 



CONTENTS 5 

PAGE 

As-You-Please. — Limited Business Ownership, In- 
dustrial Homestead Act 138 

CHAPTER VII.— LIMITED PRIVATE OWNER- 
SHIP, THE REMEDY. 
Limited Ownership in Savings Banks. — Limited 
Ownership in Building and Loan Associations. — 
Mutual Benefit Organizations. — Giant Companies on 
Basis of Limited Shareholding. — Large Enterprises 
Without Aid of Millionaire Shareholders. — Nylic 
vs. Standard Oil. — Limited Ownership vs. Private 
Monopoly. — Limited Ownership, the Remedy. — Bal- 
lot Is the Only Weapon We Need 149 

CHAPTER VIII.— ARGUMENTS AGAINST AND 
FOR LIMITED PRIVATE OWNERSHIP. 
How Would Law of Limited Ownership Benefit 
"Me"?— A Quarter Million Dollars Not Enough.— 
Principle of Limitation Is Un-American. — Limited 
Ownership Would Stifle Ambition and Curb Energy. 
— Millionaires and Capital Would Leave the Coun- 
try. — The People Are Not Rich Enough to Purchase 
Property of Millionaires. — Enterprises of Million- 
aires Benefit the People. — Millionaires Are Employ- 
ing Thousands of People. — Limited Ownership Law 
Will Be Evaded. — The Law Is Impracticable, and 
Will Be Ineffective. — Limited Ownership Indorsed 
by Prominent Men. — Unlimited Wealth vs. Unlim- 
ited Poverty. — Millionaires Wield Unlimited Power 
of Real Sovereigns. — The Final Appeal 168 



FOREWORD 

I am not a Socialist. I am an individualist, who 
believes in the right of individuals to own a comfort- 
able though limited private property, without en- 
croaching upon the great democratic principle, "The 
greatest good for the greatest number." 

I believe that everything in modern society is as it 
should be, except the unlimited private ownership of 
property, which is the root of all evil and the chief 
cause that forces the whole nation to labor in the 
wrong direction, namely, toward "the greatest good 
for the smallest number," — for the kings of wealth and 
their heirs. 

The American people are becoming restive. They 
obviously are weary of perennial tariff discussions, 
spectacular trust dissolutions, and other similar make- 
shifts which achieve next to nothing. They are en- 
titled to, and are looking for, a radical economic meas- 
ure, which will emancipate them from industrial ty- 
ranny. For want of something better, they are begin- 
ning to support the plausible yet somewhat vague 
theory of Socialism. 

Although the unnatural privilege conferred upon 
individuals to own and derive unearned profits from 

7a 



8 FOREWORD 

unlimited private possessions is the primary cause of 
all evil in modern society, — yet the remedy proposed 
by Socialists is also unnatural, because it presents the 
other extreme. The unwise rule practiced by us is : 
"Private property shall be unlimited." The Socialistic 
remedy holds forth: "Private property shall be 
abolished." Meanwhile, the safe and sound mid- 
dle course is ignored: "Private property need be 
neither unlimited nor abolished; it must be limited 
by law!" 

Socialists believe that in order to remedy the in- 
equitable distribution of our nation's wealth it is 
necessary to establish a gigantic governmental monop- 
oly, which would own, manage and distribute every- 
thing. Such extreme centralization is expected to 
bring the millennium. Yet, assuming that it would 
do so, is it not evident that many hundreds of years 
must pass before such a giant reform can be realized? 
Meantime, what are the multitudes of steadily impov- 
erished and unemployed Americans to do? Must they 
continue to suffer under the dominion of the Kings of 
Wealth and patiently wait until the Socialistic mil- 
lennium descends to the earth from the visionary 
Socialistic clouds? A cheerless prospect. 

I believe it is our duty not to supinely wait until So* 
cialistic evolution (more likely revolution) becomes a 
fact, but to enact laws which would bring immediate 
relief to wronged multitudes. 

Without presenting any "looking backward" pic- 
tures of imaginary heaven on earth, I merely venture 



FOREWORD 9 

to appeal to the sense of justice of such J.^ 
United States as love fair play, and desire t-r ''^- 
press upon them the imperative necessity ot hm- 
iting — not abolishing — the right of inarviuuaiS co ac- 
cumulate private possessions, and of curbing thereby 
the present unlimited private gathering of unearned 
profits. 

Let us not continue to remain blind to the evil that 
saps the life-blood of this nation. The institution of 
unlimited private ownership of property works great 
injustice to the majority of our population. This time- 
worn iniquity and relic of barbarism has no justifica- 
tion whatever; it should be endured no longer; it 
should be done away with, forever and ever. It 
should be limited by law. 

While reasonably moderate private property has al- 
ways been a blessing to mankind, in its unreasonably 
unlimited form it is its curse ! 

In order to prevent a possible misunderstanding, I 
wish to state here that I am far from being in favor of 
prohibiting combinations of private capital. In fact, 
I am convinced that under proper guidance great com- 
binations are advance-guards of progress and civiliza- 
tion. But they are of real benefit to the "greatest 
number" only when they are owned by millions of 
shareholders (as are our mutual savings banks, build- 
ing and loan associations, etc.) and NOT BY A FEW 
MULTIMILLIONAIRES, as they are owned at the 
present time. Then only the profits from them belong 



10 FOREWORD 

to millions, and not to a few privilegeci persons "on 
the inside." This subject is fully discussed in Chap- 
ters IV and yil of this work. 

EDWARD N. OLLY. 
Hasbrouck Heights, N. J., Dec. i, 1913. 



(THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ,n 



PROPOSED LAW OF LIMITED PRIVATE 
OWNERSHIP 

Pursuant to the Fifth Article of the Constitution, 
Congress should submit the following amendment for 
ratification by the States: 

Section i. In order to safeguard the interests of the 
majority, the individual private ownership of any prop- 
erty situated in the United States shall he limited to a 
certain definite iigure, the extent of which shall he pre- 
scribed hy Congress. 

Section 2. The inheritance of such property and the 
acquisition of it through gift hy individuals shall also he 
limited, in like manner, to a certain definite iigure. 

Section 3. Congress shall have the power to enforce 
this article hy appropriate legislation. 

Congress would thus be authorized to limit private 
possessions of individuals to any extent found reason- 
able and advisable. Such limit may be A QUARTER 
OF A MILLION OF DOLLARS as a maximum in- 
dividual ownership, and A HUNDRED THOUSAND 
DOLLARS as a maximum for inheritance or acqui- 
sition through gift ; or any other figure which Congress 
may agree upon. 

Such legislation will leave intact society as it is 
constituted at present, but it will speedily remove 
the cancer of the social body, — the multimillionairism. 



12 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Is it not plain that, when ar • ^.dividual is prohibited 
from appropriating everything ir. sight, more wealth 
will be left to go around among the rest of the people? 

Is it not evident that the enactment of such a law 
is not a reactionary but a progressive measure, not a 
revolutionary but a matter-of-fact business proposi- 
tion ; denying neither the right of property nor the 
privilege of deriving therefrom a reasonable income; 
recommending neither confiscation nor a general 
breaking-up of the so-called "capitalistic system"; ac- 
cepting everything as it is in operation at the pres- 
ent time and taking exception solely to the unnatural 
and extremely harmful privilege of individuals to own 
and profit by unlimited private possessions, a privi- 
lege which was granted them in ignorant defiance of 
the plainly discernible will of the Creator, Who de- 
creed that all things in this world should be limited to 
the extent of their utmost efficiency and usefulness? 

Upon the enactment of this law, private possessions 
should be registered and their owners informed that 
they may not increase their wealth beyond the pre- 
scribed limit. Confiscation is neither justifiable nor 
necessary. As the law will prohibit inheritances by 
individuals in excess of the stipulated amount, — say, 
$100,000, — the immense accumulations of the billion- 
aires of the period will be, upon their demise, dis- 
tributed among a great many heirs and other bene- 
ficiaries, none receiving more than a hundred thousand 
dollars. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 13 

In this way a widely diffused and infinitely more 
equitable distribution of our national wealth will be- 
come an established fact WITHIN THE LIFETIME 
OF A SINGLE GENERATION! 



Let us vote for no CANDIDATE FOR CONGRESS 
unless he pledges himself to the enactment of the 
LAW OF LIMITED PRIVATE OWNERSHIP. 



Kings of Wealth vs. The American 

People 

/ 

CHAPTER I 
iJnlimited Private Property — A Premium on Greed 

DAME FORTUNE AND A RAG-PICKER 

Once upon a time a forlorn rag-picker, engaged in 
the pursuit of his humble occupation, grumbled aloud 
about his lot in life. 

"I cannot understand," said he, "how those people 
who live in fine houses, and have all the luxuries that 
wealth can supply, are still anxious to have more and 
more riches. Such avarice is inexcusable. I certainly 
would be satisfied, and would never hanker for more." 

The Goddess of Wealth, attracted by his senti^ 
ments, determined to make an experiment. She ap- 
peared before him in person, filled his bag with gold, 
and said: "Thou art now immensely wealthy. Is it 
enough for thee?" 

The beggar looked greedily at the well-filled bag, 
and then at the smiling Goddess, and replied : "Noble 
lady, may I not have just a little more of that beau- 
tiful gold?" 

IS 



l6 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

"Very well," said Dame Fortune sternly, "but first 
try to lift thy bag, thou greedy mortal." 

Reluctantly and surlily, the beggar folded the flaps 
of his huge bag and made the attempt to throw it 
over his shoulder, when, alas, the bag burst and its 
precious contents fell with a thud to the ground, and 
the bright coins, scattered in all directions, turned 
immediately into dust. 

The poor beggar looked up in great consternation, 
but Dame Fortune had vanished, and he found him- 
self alone, forsaken, and infinitely more wretched than 
he had ever been before in the course of his miserable 
existence. 

MIGHT OF GREED 

Greed is not a quality, but a defect in human nature, 
a failing which ought to be discouraged, and not 
otherwise. 

Greed is a passion akin to gambling: the gambler 
can seldom stop at a certain limit ; neither can a greedy 
man curb his greed, unless he is compelled so to do. 

Greed reduces man to a rank below dumb animals; 
the brute knows when he has had enough; a greedy 
man does not. 

Greed is mighty. It forces men to violate their best 
intentions, to forget their sincere resolutions, and to 
trample heartlessly upon the rights of others, during 
their wild chase after more wealth. 

Greed, once grasping a man in its clutches, renders 
him more dangerous to society than a wild beast. 'A 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 17 

beast may devour a man or two ; a man possessed by 
greed devours indirectly, but no less surely, thousands 
of lives by depriving men of their means of existence, 
and by driving them to degradation and an early 
grave. 

Greed has presumably an ugly aspect and is con- 
demned by moralists and abhorred by all. Yet, strange 
to say, all attempts at muzzling the monster have, so 
far, invariably failed. The twentieth century finds it 
roaming at large unrespected, yet unimpeded and at 
its very zenith of gruesome glory and power. What 
else but a direct prohibitory law of limited private 
ownership will ever be able to subdue the monster? 

It should also be borne in mind that greed is a ma- 
lignant disease which may be cured, and should not 
be endured ; still less should it be encouraged. 

The people alone, in their supreme right and might, 
are able to loosen the grim hold of greed upon this 
land's resources, which surely are large enough and 
rich enough for all to have a fair share ! 



THE MODERN BANKER AND MARCUS 
CRASSUS 

A great banker once said: "I feel certain that if I 
were landed on a desert island with one hundred men, 
each of whom had a thousand dollars, I would soon 
get hold of most of their money. How? Simply by 
trading: buy when others are anxious to sell, and 



i8 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

sell when others are anxious to buy. That's the way 
to get rich !" 

One cannot help being deeply impressed by the 
supreme cold-bloodedness of this assertion. The 
banker evidently is altogether indifferent to the ethical 
side of the proceeding, to the lack of morality in ap- 
propriating "most of the money" of his fellow-men, 
who happen not to be as clever financiers as he. He 
also is blind to the miserable condition in which his 
weaker brethren must find themselves after their 
means of existence had been legally abstracted from 
them. Yet, were not such methods of "getting rich" 
approved by a short-sighted human (rather inhuman) 
law, the described spongelike transaction would have 
been considered both immoral and criminal. 

Inspired by greed, our foremost money-makers close 
their eyes and turn deaf ear to the woe and misery 
which they undoubtedly spread broadcast all through 
the land. Do they really consider their fellow-men as 
unfeeling, as so many mechanical automatons, who 
are devoid of any unpleasant sensation while "most 
of their money," their means of existence, is taken 
aWay from them? 

Such are the deplorable results of the remarkable 
mastery exercised by the monster greed over men 
who are otherwise good and well-meaning. 

Greed is not a modern phenomenon ; it is as ancient 
as mankind. Plutarch testifies that twenty centuries 
ago, namely in 60 B.C., a certain Marcus Crassus, who 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 19 

with Pompey and Julius Caesar formed the first Tri- 
umvirate of masters of Rome, "had a vice of avarice 
that cast a shadow upon his virtues." For instance, 
"Noticing frequent conflagrations in Rome, he made it 
his business to buy houses on fire, and others adjoin- 
ing to them, at a very low price, by reason of fear 
and distress of the owners about the event. . . ." 
"Hence, he became master of a great part of Rome." 

A complete analogy with the modern Marcus Cras- 
sus: bought when others were anxious to sell, "by 
reason of fear and distress," and thus appropriated 
the "most of the money" of his fellow-citizens. Lack 
of any restraint upon greed produces to-day the same 
results as it did twenty centuries ago. 

Describing further, Plutarch says that during his 
political campaigns Marcus Crassus entertained the 
Roman populace lavishly, often at 10,000 tables, and 
every now and then distributed among the prole- 
tariat a supply of free bread corn sufficient to last 
them for three months! However, Mr. Crassus con- 
sidered these seemingly benevolent expenditures as 
very profitable investments, for they gave him an op- 
portunity to make by subsequent graft (of Roman 
variety, on a large scale) much more than he ever 
expended on the entertainments. 

Marcus Crassus was in the habit of abstracting 
people's money by various methods which often re- 
flected strongly upon his "virtues." For instance, he 
was known to have proscribed men for no other 
reason but to seize upon their fortunes. 



20 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

So much for the commercial 
ideals of those possessed by greed, whether in olden 
times or at this day. Various, indeed, are the ways 
by which a greedy man despoils his brethren. 

Should it not be the sacred duty of society to pro- 
tect its weaker members against the greedy ones? So- 
ciety certainly should curb the avaricious, as a father 
restrains those of his children who show symptoms of 
selfishness and greed. It is not enough to punish the 
transgressor. The possibility of transgressions should 
be prevented; greed should be checked; certain limits 
of restraint should be put upon it. 

Unlimited ownership, as an institution, is an incen- 
tive for greed : far from restraining it, it stimulates 
a display of most selfish avarice. Should it be toler- 
ated as a GREED-ENCOURAGER? 

VALUED INSTITUTION OF PRIVATE 
PROPERTY 

A child never enjoys his toy unless he knows it is 
his own, "to keep." This conception "to keep" is 
magical. 

A boy without an air rifle is not a happy boy. He 
may obtain the privilege of playing with a rifle be- 
longing to one of his playmates, but he will not be 
as contented as the happy owner of the rifle. For the 
owner of a thing knows that he may do with it what- 
ever pleases him. The consciousness of the fact gives 
him great satisfaction. Certainly a flat dweller in a 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 21 

crowded city cannot enjoy his hired "home" as heart- 
ily as does his more fortunate fellow-man who resides 
in his own homestead. The consciousness of owner- 
ship imparts to the latter the same feeling of content- 
ment that is enjoyed by that boy owner of an air 
rifle. 

Human nature is the same everywhere. The long"- 
ing to own is ever-present in a human being. Child- 
hood longs to own its toys ; youth, a sweetheart ; man- 
hood, a home; and old age, its last resting place. 

The institution of private property, based upon hu- 
man nature as its solid foundation, is the earliest and 
the most invincible among the rights of individuals. 
Nothing is resented so much as an attack on this 
"vested" right, and nothing more readily brings men 
together than the necessity of defending this cherished 
right. 

The right so valued, so purely human, is destined 
to stay with us for ages to come, unless we grow 
as affectionate toward our neighbors as are the mem- 
bers of a family (or ought to be) toward each other. 
The prospect of such a millennium is not very bright, 
as yet. 

It is useless to deny the permanency of the institu- 
tion of private property. Many well-meaning men 
have essayed to do so, and tried to prove the advis- 
ability of its entire abolishment, or at least partial 
substitution. But they signally failed in their at- 
tempts. 

The right of property is with us to-day the same 



29 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

at it Was centuries ago. It is wise to accept it as 
a fact. But it is no less wise to closely inquire into 
its nature and workings, and correct its faults if it 
has any. Being human, not divine, it is liable to 
have some imperfections. In fact, it has a vital im- 
perfection: IT IS LIMITLESS! 

RIGHTS OF MEN ARE LIMITED 

The rights and privileges of men are restricted by 
the laws governing civilized societies. A man may 
freely exercise his freedom of speech, for instance; 
but he may not use that freedom to any extent he 
pleases ; he may not shout at the top of his voice on a 
public thoroughfare, nor even in his own house ; in 
both cases he would be liable to arrest for disturbing 
the peace of the community. Man is enjoying free- 
dom of conscience, of meetings, of the press ; and has 
an indisputable right to enjoy his liberty and pursue 
his happiness. Yet there are restrictions on every 
side of him. He may not obstruct highways, nor get 
intoxicated in public; may not get married without a 
license, nor take the law into his own hands; he may 
not even dispose of his own life by selling himself 
to any one, or by self-destruction. In short, man's will 
has always been subordinated to that of society. Man's 
education as a free citizen consists in ascertaining, 
and retaining in memory, the limits to his liberty, 
which are imposed upon him out of consideration for 
the corresponding freedom and rights of his fellow- 
men. 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 23 

The same can not be said of the right of property. 
Aside from a few limitations, relating to the manner 
of its exercise, this right of individuals is absolutely 
unlimited. 



PROPERTY RIGHTS ARE UNLIMITED 

To the right of property, — and to this right alone, — 
the principle of go-as-you-please has ever been and is 
to-day freely applied. If a man be sufficiently clever 
he may acquire and own, with the sanction of and 
under the protection of the law, a million of acres, or 
a thousand millions, or any amount of acres of Amer- 
ican soil. If he has wealth enough he may purchase 
and hold millions upon millions' worth of shares in 
any trusts or mergers ; he may acquire and hold any 
quantity of property and land, a State or two, or the 
whole United States, for that matter. No one would 
be able to deny his legal right to do so. Such an 
event will perhaps never take place. Yet the mere 
possibility of such an occurrence is startling by its 
enormity and absurdity. It certainly is possible and 
would be legal for any extra-clever trust to become by 
purchase the sole owner and profit-taker of all the 
railroads in this country, of all the shipping, mines, etc. 

As far as the acquisition of property is concerned, 
there has never been shown the slightest consideration 
for the similar rights of less clever citizens, unless it 
were the prohibition of downright robbery or theft. 
Aside from that it is understood and agreed that this 



24 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

really licentious right should be hampered by no re- 
strictions, no limitations. 

Does anything more glaringly unnatural exist in 
human society? 

Pharaohs of ancient Egypt, as well as other anointed 
chiefs, owned all the land and other property of their 
"subjects" because it was understood to have been so 
ordained by right divine. To-day, when the right 
divine is set aside, the permission for anyone who is 
clever enough and rich enough to acquire and legally 
hold, as his own private property, anything and every- 
thing that may please him, — even were it a whole 
country, — is, to say the least, devoid of any justifica- 
tion and so unnatural as to approach the ridiculous. 

Such a right, — or rather special privilege, — ceases 
to be human. No man, no matter how deserving and 
clever, can ever possibly earn such a fabulous reward 
for his cleverness; can ever have the moral right to 
unlimited possessions. Moreover, such a right is a 
direct defiance of nature's supreme law of limitation, 
and, as such, is bound to create disastrous conditions 
in the society of men. 

"UNCLE SAM" AN UNNATURAL PARENT 

A loving mother, treating her children to a home- 
made pie, watches carefully that no one may take 
more than his or her rightful share. She may some- 
times show partiality by putting an extra dainty 
morsel upon the plate of her particular pet, — usually 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 25 

the youngest or the weakest among her children. But 
who ever heard of a parent so heartless and cruel as 
to give nine-tenths of a pie to a pet or two and leave 
only a pittance for all the other children? 

Yet such an unnatural parent is well known to us. 
Uncle Sam, through simplicity of mind and careless- 
ness of thought, or, more likely, through ignorance, 
has actually given away to a few of his special favor- 
ites almost everything worth having. He has heart- 
lessly left for the remaining multitudes a mere pit- 
tance to scramble for. 

Instead of protecting the weak and helping the less 
favored, he has so framed the laws of the land that it 
is the strongest and the cleverest that receive "pro- 
tection" to their hearts' content, while the weaker and 
less gifted members of his family are abandoned to 
shift for themselves. As a natural result, the indus- 
trial geniuses have scrupulously followed the advice 
of the above quoted modern banker, and have absorbed 
"most of the wealth" of the American people as easily 
as sponges absorb water! 

Instead of setting a barrier to avarice. Uncle Sam 
has given it complete freedom, legalized it, and is 
awarding the richest prizes to those who are most 
avaricious. A truly abnormal proceeding! 

When we read of some pompous king of old be- 
stowing upon his minions royal grants to immense 
territories in the New World we can scarcely sup- 
press a pitying smile : the imbecility of the transac- 
tion appears to us most ludicrous. Perhaps, at some 



26 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

future time, an historian, while perusing the records 
of the twentieth century, may also be unable to sup- 
press a pitying smile when he learns how the sov- 
ereign people of America had given away to a few 
Kings of Wealth many regal grants for countless 
millions of American wealth, leaving for themselves 
only perpetual poverty to struggle against. Per- 
haps the simplicity of the transaction will appear to 
him also ludicrous, or worse. 

Thus the right of private property is, in its prin- 
ciple and foundation, natural and human ; in its "limit- 
less" application, — unnatural and harmful. In the first 
instance it is the source of happiness; in the second 
of misery. History amply testifies that the institu- 
tion of unlimited private property had converted this 
world, many a time, into a huge slaughter house ! 

GRAB-IT-ALL MONSTROSITIES 

A limitless privilege of the same nature can be found 
in no other sphere of organic life. Nothing like it 
exists among animals; not even among the wild 
beasts of the wilderness. Although a primitive ''fist- 
right" of the strongest is there freely exercised, it is 
naturally limited to the acquisition of food and pos- 
session of dens ; while similar privileges of other ani- 
mals are instinctively respected. Grab-it-all mon- 
strosities are unknown even among the fiercest of wild 
animals. Nowhere on earth is it known save among 
men! 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 27 

Who has ever heard of a tiger claiming the entire 
jungle as his own private property? Or of a family 
of buffaloes laying claim to the exclusive ownership 
of the whole Mississippi Valley? Or of a greedy bear 
appropriating as his own absolute property all the 
honey to be found in the United States? 

Yet there is a man, a reputably good and Christian 
man, who calmly asserts that all the oil that can be 
found in the United States is his own personal prop- 
erty. There are other men and families, all enlight- 
ened human beings, who claim that most of the rail- 
roads of the land are their own exclusive property. 
And there are many other men and families of the 
same ilk. Some of them claim private ownership of 
all the sugar of Uncle Sam; others of all the coffee; 
still others claim the ownership of all the products of 
the tobacco industry, etc., etc. 

Guided solely by instinct, the beast of the wilder- 
ness, having satisfied his thirst and hunger, respects 
the right to life and pursuit of happiness in his fellow 
beasts. Not so man. Although endowed with a much 
superior intellect, yet possessed by greed, he pursues 
the most selfish policy of amassing riches for his own 
personal aggrandizement, and in such pursuit he gives 
no thought to the rights to life, liberty and pursuit 
of happiness vested in his fellow-men ; he ruthlessly 
pushes them aside from his path of conquest, appro- 
priates "most of their money," and complacently re- 
marks: "That is the way to get rich." 
In this way, thanks to that unhallowed relic of bar- 



28 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

barism, the unlimited property right, man has fallen 
below the level of the wild beasts of the wilderness ! 



PREMIUM ON GREED 

Was Dame Fortune right in limiting her bounty to 
the ragpicker? Or would it h- ve been better had she 
given him another bag of gold, and still another; 
nay, millions of bags, until his apparently unlimited 
greed would have been at last satiated? Being a fair- 
minded goddess, she could not have done so, because 
then she would have rewarded greed. 

What are we, as a nation, doing in this respect? 
Are we protecting the weaker members of society 
against the encroachments of the stronger, and by so 
doing are we checking the depredations of the mon- 
ster greed? Not at all. We are actually doing the 
reverse: we are protecting the stronger against the 
weaker; we are offering rich rewards for the practice 
of selfish aggrandizement and greed; in fact, we are 
giving a PREMIUM ON GREED. 

Dame Fortune rewarded the ragpicker for his good 
intentions, and punished him for the display of un- 
reasonable greed. That is as it should be. But it hap- 
pened in a fable; in reality it is quite different: the 
greedier the man, the more he wants and the more 
he is given. If millions of bags of gold are not 
enough for him — if he still wants more and more — he 
is at liberty to appropriate anything and everything. 
An absurd permission, is it not? 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 29 

Anyone can perceive that what Dame Fortune did 
was right, and what we are doing is wrong. We 
should let the clever man have his big bag of gold, 
but should say to him: *'Thou canst have no more, 
for there are others who also are desirous and en- 
titled to share in the national possessions." Then 
only the greedy one would have been compelled to 
curb his greed and stop "hankering for more/' for the 
obvious reason that that "more" would not be forth- 
coming. Thus the premium on greed would have been 
abolished. Such would have been the only right way 
to protect the weaker members of society against 
their stronger and shrewder brethren. 

REIGN OF MILLIONAIRISM 

How far from such a desirable condition is the pres^ 
ent state of affairs in the United States! 

Of all the countries in the world, the United States 
are presenting at this time the most vivid picture of 
an up-to-date millionairism. With us this "million- 
airism" is truly grand. A few excessively wealthy 
persons own such fabulous fortunes as were never 
before even dreamed of. The incomes of some of 
them are reaching the stupendous figure of a million 
dollars a week! Such an income is one thousand 
times larger than the annual salary of the Chief Ex- 
ecutive of the nation! 

Even the fairy tales of childhood are outdone by 
the frenzied reign of modern American millionairism. 



30 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

The wealth of an average multimillionaire equals the 
combined holdings of two hundred thousand of his 
less favored fellow Americans ! Verily, truth is stranger 
than fiction. 

Five thousand American millionaires own in aggre- 
gate more wealth than all the rest of us. 

The nations of the old world have had one king 
each; we have five thousand of them! 

Statistics show that a large portion of the United 
States is the private property of millionaires. The 
question arises: how soon will the entire United 
States become their private property? Their foretype, 
Marcus Crassus of Rome, succeeded in becoming the 
owner of the "most part of Rome" ; why not a Rocke- 
feller of the near future be in a position to become the 
owner of the whole of the United States ? 

Is it not remarkable that our industrial kings are 
still "hankering for more"? Spurred by that dread 
power, greed, they have entered into all kinds of com- 
binations and conspiracies, lawful and otherwise, 
created the now infamous trusts and monopolies, in- 
jected oceans of water into industrial stocks, and ac- 
quired the ownership or control of everything worth 
mentioning. Yet still they want "more." 

Meanwhile, the people, the supposed owners and 
real producers of the nation's wealth, are receiving as 
their share of that immense wealth a portion which 
is hardly sufficient to keep their body and soul to- 
gether. 

Such are the fruits of unlimited private ownership ! 



JHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 31 

CHAPTER II 
Nation's Wealth Limited — Private Property Unlimited 

WEALTH VS. POVERTY 

Diamonds, rubies, pearls and emeralds by the bushel- 
ful; gold, silver, cobalt, quicksilver by the carloads; 
trainloads of costly velvets, silks, laces, paintings, 
cutglass; hundreds of trainloads of iron, steel, lead, 
coal, cotton, wool, grain, meat and fruit; millions of 
horses, cows, sheep, hogs, fowl and game ; inland seas, 
great rivers, wonderful canals, primeval forests; bil- 
lions of acres of land available for cultivation ; magnifi- 
cent public and private buildings and palaces; beauti- 
ful churches, mammoth hotels and many-storied busi- 
ness offices; perfect means of communication and 
transportation; numberless automobiles, yachts, aero- 
planes ; and countless myriads of other valuable things 
that make life enjoyable ; — such is this enchanted land 
of ours, the veritable realm of wealth ! 

Such a bird's-eye view of American wealth may 
create the impression that we have reached the high- 
est point of prosperity and happiness ; that with such 
enormous wealth in our possession we cannot harbor 
among us such an ungainly thing as poverty ; and that 
certainly thousands of roving tramps and hundreds 
of thousands of the "slowly starving" unemployed 
cannot possibly be found amidst all that glorious abun- 
dance. 



32 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Alas, we know better! The apparently improbable 
co-existence of Plenty and Want, of Progress and 
Poverty, is in full evidence in our land. Splendid 
wealth and unsightly poverty stand side by side, 
grimly eyeing each other; wealth with a look of ill- 
concealed contempt and abhorrence; poverty, — with 
the submissively sullen look of a dependent. Wealth 
would dearly like to get rid of its ragged companion; 
but poverty clings to it like grim death, and, — so we 
are told, — must remain with us forever, as a fixed 
institution. 

Such an uninviting picture is plainly seen in our 
large cities, where wealth is at its best and poverty 
at its worst. Although in a somewhat modified and 
softened form, the same is observable in smaller towns, 
in villages, and throughout the whole land. 

The condition is certainly abnormal. One cannot 
be prosperous and poor at the same time. Either the 
American people are prosperous or they are not. The 
volume of wealth and the reputed prosperity indicate 
that they are; the presence of poverty argues that 
they are not. Poverty gives the lie to prosperity! 

A family cannot be considered prosperous when any 
of its members feel the pinch of poverty; how much 
less so if most of them are in a similar plight! We, 
as a large family of human beings, have no right to 
consider ourselves prosperous while a single case of 
unmerited poverty exists in our land. Still less are 
we entitled to the claim of general prosperity when 
millions of our fellow citizens, able and willing to 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 33 

work, remain almost constantly in enforced idleness 
and in the clutches of poverty. 

Only after poverty entirely disappears and is heard 
of no longer may we say, with well-earned pride: 
"We Americans are a prosperous people." Not till 
then! 

Poverty is that discord which destroys harmony 
in human society. In fact, as long as poverty re- 
mains in our midst, harmony is impossible, and the 
whole of society presents a huge discord. 

Therefore, our warcry should be : "Down with pov- 
erty !" We should declare against it a war of extermi- 
nation, and fight it incessantly until it disappears from 
the face of the earth. Until then, let us not be blinded 
by the glitter of surface wealth ; but let us study and 
solve the problem of how to get rid of dread poverty, 
the presence of which among us, in this enlightened 
twentieth century, is a national dishonor and an im- 
peachment of national intelligence! 

WEALTH IS NOT GOLD 

Contrary to popular opinion, gold does not play a 
prominent part among the items of national wealth ; 
in fact, it constitutes only a small fraction of the total 
wealth. As the measure of wealth, however, and as 
the universally adopted medium of exchange, — as Pur- 
chasing Power, — gold has no peer. Consequently, as 
such, it is desired by everybody to a degree that ap- 
proaches adoration. 



34 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Gold, thou visible god, 

Will make black, white; foul, fair; wrong, right; 

Base, noble; old, young; coward, valiant. 

— William Shakespeare. 

Thus, although comprising only a small portion of 
wealth, gold, in view of its acquired qualities, is of 
great importance in all social and commercial transac- 
tions, and is erroneously confused with wealth itself. 
An impression has been created that gold and wealth 
are identical, and that wealth, either of individuals or 
of a nation, consists of all kinds of money, with gold 
as its basis. 

This impression, however wrong, is so deeply 
rooted in the popular mind that real wealth, consist- 
ing of eminently useful as well as valuable commodi- 
ties, has been retired into the background, where it 
remains almost ignored. 

We are, of course, well pleased to know of the abun- 
dance of wheat, cotton, timber, etc., in our land; yet, 
somehow, the consciousness of the fact does not 
make us feel wealthy. On the other hand, when we 
read of a billion-dollar Congress carelessly appropri- 
ating another hundred millions for a new set of battle- 
ships, or of the Secretary of the Treasury signing a 
forty-million-dollar check as the purchase price for the 
costly Panama enterprise — then only are we conscious 
jf be ig rich. 

Goid, the representative of wealth, is taken for 
wealth itself, and the ease with which gold and money 
generally may be exchanged for anything that consti- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 35 

lEutes real wealth has produced the faulty yet lasting 
impression that money and wealth are synonymous. 
Thus a man possessing a million dollars or a corpora- 
tion worth a billion, appear before our mind's eye as 
owning that amount of ready cash, in gold, silver, 
greenbacks, etc. Although, upon reflection, we easily 
perceive our error, yet the delusion is so general, clings 
to us so tenaciously, that it permanently misleads 
many, and effectively obscures the whole field of dis- 
cussion upon the nature and distribution of national 
wealth. 

MILLIONAIRES OWN WEALTH, NOT 
CURRENCY 

Deluded by the word "dollars," the people entirely 
ignore the fact that the fortunes of millionaires and 
corporations consist not of dollars but of those useful 
and consequently valuable objects which are the com- 
posite parts of our national wealth. 

In the city of New York, for instance, there is a 
score of individuals who are credited with owning 
five hundred million dollars' worth of wealth. They 
certainly do not own that amount of gold or silver or 
any kind of currency. They own the substance far 
more valuable than gold or silver, viz., strictly limited 
land and buildings in the city of New York, the value 
of which increases constantly and automatically. 
While the value of gold remains almost stationary the 
value of the property of the said twenty New Yorkers 
is being multiplied a hundredfold, for real estate in 



36 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

the city of New York is worth to-day a hundred times 
as much as it was worth thirty or forty years ago. 

Therefore, had the fortunes of these particular mil- 
lionaires consisted of gold, greenbacks, etc., we might 
remain indifferent. But, as they are well on the 
road toward ownership — Marcus Crassus' fashion, — of 
the "most part" of the chief seaport of this nation, it 
is time for us to pause and give the subject the atten- 
tion it deserves. "A score of individuals owning one- 
half of the city of New York" sounds very queerly in 
a democratic republic, and should attract more than 
a passing notice from intelligent American people. 

This is only one instance. In other directions — in 
fact, everywhere — similar conditions prevail: modern 
Croesuses and their creations, the trusts, have acquired 
absolute ownership, not of dollars but of the parts 
and parcels of our national wealth. 

Hence it is vitally important, in order to clearly 
understand the subject in hand, to constantly bear in 
mind that MONEY AND WEALTH ARE NOT 
THE SAME THING, and that American multimil- 
lionaires do not own gold, silver and other currency, 
but the profit-bringing parts of our national wealth, 
such as the highly profitable oilfields, coal and other 
mines, railroads, etc. 

NATIONAL WEALTH IS LIMITED 

There exists in the popular mind another and still 
graver delusion in regard to this nation's wealth. 
Owing to its magnitude, the wealth of this land ap- 



(THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 37 

pears unlimited, and such it is supposed to be. Its 
great extent resembles the vast expanse of an ocean, 
while its countless composite parts, by their change- 
able nature and extreme flexibility, appear as renew- 
able and inexhaustible as the water in the ocean. It 
seems that no matter how much wealth may be taken 
out, there will still always remain so much that no 
perceptible impression can be made upon the whole 
volume of wealth. In short, it is taken for granted 
that the wealth of this nation is unlimited. 

This delusion works like a pall spread before the 
eyes of the people to obstruct their vision. Laboring 
under this misconception, they regard with serene 
indifference the advent and ceaseless augmentation of 
immense private fortunes. They are confident that 
the formation and growth of millionairism makes but 
little impression, if any, upon the limitless bulk of 
national wealth, and that no matter how much of it 
may be appropriated by individuals or corporations, 
society cannot be harmed by the fact. 

Such a rosy view of the resources and possibilities 
of our country is, unfortunately, based upon a wrong 
foundation, and consequently is erroneous and not sup- 
ported by facts. 

Uncle Sam, being a prudent business man, causes a 
decennial census-taking of his children and their chat- 
tels. The official enumerators usually have no diffi- 
culty in ascertaining the worldly possessions of the 
people and the exact total wealth of the United States. 
It has been found that on June i, 1910, the American 



38 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

national wealth presented the exact figure of $107,- 
104,211,917, not a dollar more or less. 

Had the wealth of our country been as unlimited 
as water in the ocean, — and as the people imagine it 
to be, — it surely could not have been so easily ascer- 
tained, enumerated and appraised. Everything that 
had any value was taken into consideration. All the 
real and personal property of the people; all public 
and private buildings, mines, forests, crops, livestock; 
in short, absolutely everything of value that was con- 
tained on June i, 1910, within the borders of the broad 
dominion of Uncle Sam. Obviously, there is a certain 
limit to it if the sum total can be so easily found. 

Our land has well-defined natural limits not to be 
transgressed. We have an ocean on each side, the Do- 
minion of Canada above, and Mexico below us. The 
efforts to expand in any direction would be met with 
opposition. We must be contented with the posses- 
sion of a limited landed property. 

As regards the particulars of that property, it is 
well known that our wealth in timber is fast diminish- 
ing, and that this gives uneasiness to the forestry 
experts, who recommend various measures for its con- 
servation and preservation. The same may be said of 
the naturally exhaustible coal lands, oil fields, and 
other resources of the land. Natural limitations of 
some parts of our wealth are beyond dispute. It is 
quite evident, for instance, that should all oil fields 
become the property of one family, the rest of the 
people will be (are?) obliged to pay that family any 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 39 

price it may "fix," because there will be no more oil 
to be had anywhere else in this whole broad land. 

So far so good. Yet it may be stated that the 
natural limitation of our resources need not give us 
mucti uneasiness, because the resources of our land 
are, generally speaking, so great that they can supply 
plentifully a population many times exceeding the 
present one. The exhaustible forests, coal mines, etc., 
if properly managed, will last for many generations 
to come, and, when they are finally exhausted, the in- 
genuity of the American people can be relied on to 
invent some efficient substitutes. So there is no ap- 
parent reason for worry on this account. 

POSSIBILITIES ARE LIMITLESS 

Dame Nature appears to have been even more boun- 
tiful in other directions. Her generous gifts, such as 
crops, cotton, wool, livestock, etc., are not only innu- 
merable but can unquestionably be renewed and in- 
creased at will, and to a really unlimited extent. 

A superficial observer may exclaim : "Our national 
wealth is indeed boundless." It is not so. Our 
wealth is not boundless ; it is our possibilities to pro- 
duce and increase wealth that are limitless. 

We have the facilities, — immense natural resources 
and a highly industrious people, — to produce a truly 
immense and limitless wealth, and thereby banish 
from this land every case of unmerited poverty and 
privation. 



40 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Why don't we do it? Why is it that wealth actu- 
ally produced falls so far short of supplying with 
comfort and ease all the people, without a single ex« 
ception? Why is it that our wealth appears, in this 
respect, very much limited indeed, and that every now 
and then, to add insult to injury, an inane cry is 
raised of overproduction. Imagine overproduction in 
a country teaming with indigence ! 

What is it that causes production to stop short be- 
fore general comfort is reached? What is it that de- 
prives the majority of American people of an equitable 
participation in our immense American wealth? In 
order to find the correct answer to these most im- 
portant questions we must inquire into the nature and 
effects of that ancient law of supply and demand which 
is, as yet, only superficially understood. 

WEALTH IS LIMITED BY PURCHASING 
POWER OF THE PEOPLE 

A manufacturer does not make a million chairs when 
he knows that he can dispose of only one-tenth of that 
amount. A farmer would be unwise to raise a mil- 
lion pumpkins when his experience teaches him that 
he can sell only a much smaller quantity. Thus, 
wealth produced by a manufacturer, or a farmer, or 
by any other producer, must always be complied with 
the demand for it. It is strictly limited by such de- 
mand. Men do not work in factories or on farms for 
the fun of the thing. They do so for wages or profit, 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 41 

because the owner, or manager, knows that there is 
a demand for the goods produced by them. 

It seems plain that demand (which is closely allied 
with purchasing power) is that force which keeps the 
production of wealth in any nation within certain 
limits, beyond which it would be unprofitable to pro- 
duce more wealth. When the demand is large, wealth 
is increased, and vice-versa. A naturally unlimited 
expansion of wealth is always regulated and strictly 
limited by the demand for it. 

American wealth is no exception to the rule: what- 
ever the American people may demand, and are able 
to purchase, is produced, and no more. THEREIN 
LIES THE LIMIT OF AMERICAN WEALTH. 

It is most Imperative to bear in mind that this is the 
truth and nothing but the truth. Political economists 
know this very well. Yet they serenely dismiss the 
subject with the superficial statement: "As human 
wants and desires are unlimited, a demand for goods 
is also unlimited." Obviously short-sighted reasoning, 
for unfortunately the ''wants and desires" of the ma- 
jority of the American people are indeed unlimited, yet 
their real ''demand" for goods, — what they can pay 
for them, — is far from being unlimited ; in fact, it does 
not amount to much ! 

In order to become an economic force, demand must 
be supported by purchasing power, by money. With- 
out it, demand is only a potentiality, not a reality; a 
mere "desire," generally unsatisfied, until the means 
are procured for converting it into "demand." 



42 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

This point is inexplicably overlooked by orthodox 
political economists. It is sometimes hinted at, but 
never thoroughly analyzed. 



PROSPERITY DEPENDS ON PURCHASING 
POWER OF THE PEOPLE 

In the animal kingdom, and among savages, physical 
force is sufficient for the effective backing of wants 
and desires, and therefore it takes the place of "pur- 
chasing power." It constitutes the real "demand" of 
beasts and savages. 

We, being civilized, may not use our physical prow- 
ess for such a purpose, for, if we do, we are liable to 
land in prison or in a lunatic asylum. We must sup- 
port our "demand" for any goods with a certain quan- 
tity of substantial purchasing power in the shape of 
gold, silver, greenbacks or other magic "open sesame" 
of modern times. 

We must have gold or other currency, otherwise 
our desires, and even wants and necessities, will re- 
main unsatisfied, and the "demand" will be non-exist- 
ent (except in the books on Political Economy). 

Economic demand is so closely allied to the pur- 
chasing power of a given community that it may 
safely be assumed that the GENERAL PROSPER- 
ITY OF A NATION IS EXPRESSED IN THE 
AGGREGATE PURCHASING POWER OF ITS 
PEOPLE. Nothing new, perhaps, yet so far but 
poorly understood. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 43 

As regards the American nation, the aggregate pur- 
chasing power of its people cannot be very large, 
when we know from reliable official statistics that 
more than 90% of our people are living on the aver- 
age wages of $9 a week for a family of five! Such 
meager wages are barely sufficient to satisfy the wants 
and necessities of our population; they are utterly 
inadequate to satisfy any desires for comfort, recrea- 
tion, leisure, etc. Therefore, the desires of the ma- 
jority of the American people, lacking the means for 
their support, do not rise to the dignity of a "demand" 
and remain unsatisfied. Then the corresponding "pro- 
duction" of goods becomes limited, and even crippled, 
and the period of "hard times" sets in. 

The wealth of any nation is thus limited in its vol- 
ume. Anything that tends to increase the aggregate 
purchasing power of the majority of the people widens 
these limits and increases wealth; anything that has 
a tendency to decrease the people's purchasing power 
correspondingly decreases its wealth. 

When all the profits from the most important indus- 
tries of the country flow unrestrainedly to a few fami- 
lies, while the rest of the people are compelled to 
live exclusively on their meager "wages," is it not 
ridiculous to call such a condition "prosperity"? The 
United States at this time is exactly in such a con- 
dition. The national wealth is now sadly limited by 
the withdrawal from the purchasing power of the 
American people of almost the entire ,volume ol 
profits from their industries. 



^4 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

Obviously, a rearrangement of the channels through 
which the profits from our industries flow is imper- 
ative. Elimination of millionairism by the enactment 
of a law limiting the private possessions of individuals 
say to $250,000, is a step in the right direction. It 
cannot accomplish the desired result all at once; but 
it is bound in the course of time to TURN TOWARD 
THE PEOPLE THE TIDE OF PROFITS FROM 
THE PEOPLE'S INDUSTRIES. By so doing it 
will add greatly to the aggregate purchasing power of 
the American people, will broaden the limits of pro- 
duction and wealth, will spread broadcast the comforts 
of life, and will make unmerited poverty a condition 
of the past, to be remembered with sadness and horror. 

WEALTH OF ROBINSON CRUSOE 

Before we leave this chapter let us take a look, by 
way of illustration, at our old friend, Robinson Cru- 
soe, on his lonely island. 

Crusoe needed no purchasing power. When he 
found a heap of gold he addressed it disrespectfully: 
"Oh, drug! What art thou good for? One of these 
knives is to me worth all this heap. ... I have no 
manner of use for thee." 

On the other hand, when, during his explorations 
of the island, he found many articles useful and valu- 
able to him, he wrote in his diary: "I found many 
cocoa trees, oranges and grapevines, and I was ex- 
ceeding glad of them. I contemplated with great 
pleasure the fruitfulness of the valley. ... I was the 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 45 

lord of the whole manor. ... I had nothing to covet, 
for I had all I was now capable of enjoying. ... I 
might have raised a ship-loading of corn, but I had 
no use for it. So I let as little grow as I thought 
enough for my ocr- '-".,. I had timber enough 
to build me a fleet ot ships; and I had grapes enough 
to have made wine, or to have cured into raisins, and 
to have loaded that fleet when it had been built. But 
I had enough to eat and supply my wants, and what 
was all the rest to me? If I killed more flesh than I 
could eat, the dog must eat it or the vermin; if I 
sowed more corn than I could use, it must be spoiled. 
In a word, the nature and experience of things dic- 
tated to me that all the good things of this world are 
no further good to us, than they are for our use." 
There is much wisdom in this homely reasoning of 
our friend Crusoe. His wealth was apparently un- 
limited, yet a census-taking would have revealed the 
fact that all his available wealth consisted only of a 
cave or two, a flock of goats, some clothes, tools and 
a stock of provisions — a quantity of articles strictly 
limited by the demand for them. His wants and de- 
sires having been satisfied, all other things to be 
found on the island were "of no manner of use" for 
him, for he had "enough for his occasion." 

OBJECT LESSON FROM CRUSOE'S ISLAND 

The situation and philosophy of Robinson Crusoe 
are instructive as well as interesting. 

First of all we notice that he had "no manner of 



46 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

use" for gold. A corroboration of the statement made 
at the commencement of this chapter, that gold is 
not wealth but only an expedient measure of the same 
and a medium of exchange. As both of these attri- 
butes of gold were of no value for a lone man, he 
rightly pronounced it a useless "drug." 

Furthermore, Crusoe had the facilities and plenty 
of time to produce hundreds of times as much as he 
actually produced. But he voluntarily limited his 
wealth production, adapting it to his wants. Thus, 
by his own volition, his apparently unlimited wealth 
was made strictly limited to the extent of supplying 
his wants and desires. 

Such a phenomenon is observable everywhere, be 
it on the desert island of Robinson Crusoe or in the 
well-populated and highly civilized United States. 
The extent of the wealth of any nation is invariably 
proportionate to the welfare of its population. The 
higher the welfare, the larger the wealth; and vice- 
versa. 

The welfare of Robinson Crusoe was, upon his 
own testimony, very high. He had nothing to covet, 
having all he was capable of enjoying. He did not 
care to increase his wealth-production, because all his 
wants and desires were fully satisfied. 

How do millions of American citizens compare with 
Robinson Crusoe? Have they also nothing to covet? 
Have they all they are capable of enjoying? Have 
they "killed more flesh than they could eat . . . 
sowed more corn than they could use"? Are they all 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 47. 

well housed, comfortably clad, nourishingly fed, and, 
in short, are all their wants and desires fully satis-^ 
fied? Alas, all these questions must be answered in 
the negative. Many Americans are infinitely worse 
off than Crusoe ever was on his miserable island. Al- 
though their natural resources are unquestionably 
great, their energy for work and inventive genius ex- 
ceptional, and their intelligence certainly superior to 
that of a poor shipwrecked sailor — yet the majority of 
them are barely satisfying their necessities, while 
their desires for comfort, recreation, leisure, pursuit of 
arts, etc., remain mostly unsatisfied. 

For this unenviable condition they have no one to 
blame but themselves because they have unwisely 
granted to a few individuals the unnatural and ex- 
tremely harmful privilege of APPROPRIATING 
UNLIMITED PORTIONS OF THE LIMITED 
.WEALTH OF THE AMERICAN NATION. 



^8 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

CHAPTER III 
Unlimited Unearned Profits — Unlimited Evil 

EQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION— BASIS OF 
PROSPERITY 

"The corporations of the future will serve 
the public as semi-public servants, with own- 
ership widespread among the public. In 
broadly distributed ownership among the pub- 
lic and labor the profits are distributed among 
the people." 

— Geo. W. Perkins, in an interview in the 
"New York World." 

It is the prevalent opinion, upheld by many scien- 
tists, tnat only three things are necessary for creating 
wealth and rendering the people prosperous : plenty 
of productive work, men to do it, and means to do it 
with. While it is true that the presence of all these 
three factors is needed for making wealth, a fourth 
factor is required to bring that wealth within the 
reach of the entire population,— EQUITABLE DIS- 
TRIBUTION OF WEALTH. A condition without 
which "prosperity" is a delusion and a snare. 

We need not look abroad for the proof of the truth- 
fulness of the above assertion. Our own country 
proves it beyond doubt. We have an abundance of 
productive work to be done; an industrial army of 
able men to do it; and great natural resources and 



I 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 49 

facilities to do it with. Yet copious evidence demon- 
strates that we are, as a nation, prosperous only on 
the surface, — or rather on the top. Such skin-deep 
prosperity is explainable by the absence of that fourth 
important factor, — the equitable distribution of wealth. 
We have indeed in our midst a few fabulously wealthy 
families, while the bulk of our population consists of 
families either homeless or owning property not worth 
mentioning : according to the figures of the latest cen- 
sus, the majority of our people own only property 
represented by their fire insurance policies, — a pitiful 
average of $250 worth of household furniture. If 
such a condition can be dignified by name "prosper- 
ity," then what is "poverty"? 

It is apparent that the making of wealth is not all- 
sufficient. Political economists, who emphasize the 
good that results from investment by millionaires of 
their great fortunes into business, obviously are attach- 
ing undue importance to the production of wealth, at 
the same time slighting the equally important, — if not 
more important, — distribution of goods produced. For 
of what use is it to produce immense stacks of goods 
only to burden the shelves of the retailing tradesmen? 
The people cannot afford to purchase them, having 
but meager resources at their command. And the lat- 
ter will never increase, unless the distribution of 
wealth becomes more equitable than it is at the pres- 
ent time. 



ISO KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

TWO CHANNELS OF DISTRIBUTION OF 
WEALTH 

The wealth of the American people, while in the 
process of economic distribution, flows incessantly 
through two main channels : Wages and Profits. 
There are many subdivisions of these chief ways ; but, 
to simplify the discussion of the subject, all the sources 
of income may satisfactorily be designated by these 
two general names. 

In order to satisfy our needs and desires we must 
draw from one or the other of these channels. The 
life-giving fluid that flows through them is, like the 
precious water in the desert wells, indispensable for 
our very existence. There is positively no other way 
of making a living. We must either offer our ser- 
vices in an open market, and receive for them wages 
(salaries, fees, commissions, etc.), or, if we happen to 
own any capital, we may let other people have the 
use of it for a consideration of profits (interest, divi- 
dends, rent, etc.). 

It is indisputable that the majority of the American 
people are relying exclusively on wages for their liv- 
ing; "profits" are known to them by name only. From 
the President of the Union, at $75,000 per annum, all 
through the various stages of wage-earning down to 
an office-boy at $3 per week, the people draw from 
one channel only, the wages. Such is the lot of 999 
men out of every 1,000 Americans. 

iThe lucky "thousandth" men, though naturally very 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 51 

few in number, have the immense channel of profits 
all to themselves: they draw from it to their hearts' 
content and to the exclusion of the rest of the people. 
This fact is strangely overlooked by the orthodox 
political economists. 

Therefore, the problem before us is narrowed to 
this : how can a distribution of the national wealth be 
so regulated as to enable the remaining 999 men to 
also participate in profits in addition to their wages? 
Such participation is not only desirable, but impera- 
tive-; without it an equitable distribution is an impos- 
sibility, unless we accept the Socialistic dictum that 
profits should be abolished altogether. 

Unless such a participation takes place, the entire 
economic structure of the United States will soon pre- 
sent (some say it is presenting) a picture of the Ro- 
man Republic at the time of its decadence: a few 
immensely rich Kings of Wealth and the majority of 
the people everlastingly struggling with dread pov- 
erty. Indeed, no amount of political liberty can do 
the American people any good as long as their eco- 
nomic condition is wrong at its very foundation. It 
effectually prohibits the people from the enjoyment 
of their political freedom. 

But can such a participation of the "greatest num- 
ber" of the people in the profits from their industries 
be effected? It certainly can. The purpose of subse- 
quent pages is to show that the enactment of the pro- 
posed Law of Limited Ownership is the right way 
of procedure. It can accomplish the desired result in 



52 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Sin honest, straightforward way, without recourse to 
any subterfuges and makeshifts. It will make the 
equitable distribution of American wealth a fact. 

Before proceeding further, however, it is necessary 
to inquire into the nature of "profits." 

PROFITABLE FACTORY OF MASTER 
GWYNNE 

Let us imagine a young gentleman, Alfred Gwynne, 
who has inherited from his father a well-appointed 
lace factory worth $100,000. This "business property" 
yields him a net "profit" of $6,000 per annum. 

A visit to his factory would reveal to the gaze of a 
visitor a large hall filled with quaint-looking and high- 
ly complicated machinery. Accompanied by the hum- 
ming sound of rapidly revolving wheels and belts, nu- 
merous finger-like attachments to the machinery are 
bewilderingly dancing, now up and down, now side- 
ways, but always catching at some golden silk or 
other delicate thread, and producing lacework of ex- 
quisite designs. To a casual observer this would ap- 
pear like an enchanted world. The human-like intel- 
ligence, combined with perfect accuracy and precision 
of these ingenious machines, will, no doubt, fill him 
with admiration. 

It is Master Gwynne's capital. Everyone of these 
costly machines is faithfully working for him, their 
"owner," and coining for him his profits of $500 per 
month. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 53 

But, as a matter of fact, the machines are not work- 
ing unaided. Were there no living labor, whose per- 
sonal services are operating them, these machines, in- 
genious though they be, would have been worth only 
as much as a junkyard would have allowed for them 
as scrap iron. The presence of "living" labor always 
transforms inanimate worthlessness into high value. 

So in this factory there are also in evidence diverse 
human working machines, not exactly "owned," but 
"employed" by Master Gwynne. A visitor would ob- 
serve some unnaturally quiet and solemn-looking little 
girls, patiently replenishing feed boxes with the new 
stock of thread ; several hard-faced and begrimed men, 
tending to the necessary lubrication of the machines ; 
and in the office the apparently hump-backed young 
men, bending over their "books," and the automatic 
girl typewriters pounding incessantly on their key- 
boards. These are the receivers of "wages." 

Master Gwynne, the happy owner of the inanimate 
machinery, and employer (semi-owner) of the ani- 
mated machines, need not trouble himself about any- 
thing: his manager will hire his employees; will dis- 
charge or lay them off, when necessary; will pur- 
chase new stock and sell the produced goods ; in short, 
will superintend the entire work in the factory and 
attend to all the details of the management. The 
only thing which Master Gwynne has of necessity to 
do is— TO DRAW CHECKS AND ENJOY LIFE, 
keeping within the comfortable limits of his obvi- 
ously unearned profits of $17 per day. 



54 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Master Gwynne, without rendering any services 
whatever, is at liberty to pursue the easy and indo- 
lent life of a human butterfly, that flutters from 
flower to flower, feasting upon the sweets of life, with- 
out in the least earning them. His "machines" are 
doing for him yeoman's service, enabling him to pass 
through life as if it were a continuous holiday! 

EXPLOITATION OF TWO SETS OF 
WORKERS 

With the proceeds from his business property Mas- 
ter Gwynne is in a position to command the annual 
labor of another set of about fifty of his country- 
men, who will zealously work for his benefit. In ex- 
change for the "purchasing value" of his income he 
will find, daily, waiting for him, respectful servants, 
excellent meals, fashionable clothing, an auto for a 
drive, clubrooms for an afternoon lounge, a box in a 
theater for the evening, and on every side the pleas- 
ant smiles of all who may come within the touch of 
his magic wand of gold. 

No physical or mental exertion will be required of 
him : all the foregoing good things will be his, as long 
as he desires them, in exchange for the value of his 
snug income of $6,000 per annum. 

On the other hand, we have seen that the magic 
dollars of his "profits," just before they reached his 
pocketbook, were actually "earned" by the combined 
labor of his machinery and his employees; he cer- 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 55 

tainly did not earn them; his factory employees did 
that for him. 

Thus it is plain that Master Gwynne is enjoying the 
SPECIAL PRIVILEGE of every capitalist to exploit 
two sets of workers: those who by actual labor in 
his factory have earned for him his annual profits of 
$6,000, and those elsewhere who also by actual toil 
are supplying him with all he wishes to have, TAK- 
ING FROM HIM IN EXCHANGE THE VERY 
DOLLARS EARNED FOR HIM BY THE FIRST 
SET OF WORKERS. 

To be a capitalist, even in a small way, is indeed a 
special privilege! 

Such is invariably the process of the so-called "liv- 
ing on profits" (were it dividends, rent, interest or 
any other form of income on capital). The dollars 
that make up such an income must be earned by some 
one's labor before they reach the capitalist. They do 
not drop from the skies, neither are they gathered on 
bushes by the roadside; someone's actual labor must 
earn them before they find their way to the fortunate 
go-between, the profit-gatherer. 

The owner of capital may remain idle as long as he 
pleases, while two distinct sets of workers will inces- 
santly labor for his benefit. It is his ''special privi- 
lege" to give to his country absolutely nothing for all 
the good things he receives. 

Applying the same reasoning and analysis to the 
phenomena of the industrial world of the present day, 
we can readily perceive that THOUSANDS UPON 



56 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

THOUSANDS OF AMERICANS ARE CEASE- 
LESSLY TOILING FOR THE BENEFIT OF 
EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THE INDUS- 
TRIAL UNLIMITED OWNERS. This statement 
is made without any malice, bitterness or envy; it is 
merely a truthful and impartial analysis of the un- 
natural conditions existing LEGALLY in modern so- 
ciety, with the people's consent, but hardly with their 
clear understanding. 

The fortunate owners of the explained special privi- 
lege may, if they choose (and many of them unques- 
tionably do so), remain indefinitely in luxurious idle- 
ness, giving personally to their country nothing ex- 
cept their ornamental selves, which, unfortunately, are 
often worse than nothing. In this connection the fol- 
lowing specimens of glittering worthlessness may be 
duly remembered: a millionaire youth of carnation 
fame; a millionaire man-slayer; a self-expatriated 
American multimillionaire, and many others of the 
same nature. 

SHOULD PROFITS BE ABOLISHED? 

We have taken a passing glance at the personnel of 
the factory employees of Master Gwynne. They be- 
long to the well-known type of "tenement-dwelling" 
wage-workers. They lead an unenviable existence on 
the average wages of $9 per week, and their work-day 
consists of from 10 to 12 hours of uninteresting and 
monotonous toil. These unfortunate semi-slaves of 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 57 

the unnatural system of modern society are toiling 
week after week, and month after month, and receiv- 
ing their market-regulated "existence wages," while 
the entire profits from the business go to Master 
Gwynne, and provide him with the means to enjoy 
life. 

Master Gwynne may be an exquisite young man, of 
excellent manners and irreproachable habits; — yet it 
must be admitted that the fact of his enjoyment of 
the luxuries and pleasures of life at the expense of 
those pitiful tenement dwellers, — and of that other 
group of no less hard-working men, — is unjust and un- 
natural, to say the least. 

An income from capital, — were it interest, dividend, 
rent, or any other form of profit, — is always of the 
same nature: it brings to its owner the unearned, 
by him, fruits of the labor of his fellow-men, and also 
enables him to command both the present and the 
future labor of still another group of men. In fact, IT 
GIVES HIM A MORTGAGE ON THE LABOR OF 
FUTURE GENERATIONS YET UNBORN. 

Is it not an awful privilege? Is it right that human 
beings should remain on the level of beasts of bur- 
den, and labor for someone else to reap the benefit 
from their toil, while they themselves are allowed only 
enough "fodder" to keep them in good working con- 
dition? Is it right for one man to say to many men, 
in the words of Abraham Lincoln: "You toil and 
work and earn bread, and I'll eat it"? Is it right that 
any good-for-nothing idler should be permitted, — nay, 



58 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

encouraged, — to remain in luxurious idleness? If it 
is wrong, what is to be done? Should the income on 
private capital, — profits, — be abolished, as the Social- 
ists advise us? 

PROFITS ON LIMITED PRIVATE PROPERTY 
ARE JUSTIFIABLE 

Over 300 years ago a law was enacted in ^England 
which announced that "Any interest on capital, being 
forbidden by the law of God, is a sin and detestable." 
Furthermore, the law imposed ''A forfeiture of the 
principal upon those who had taken an interest of 10% 
or less, and upon those who had taken more than 10% 
a forfeiture of treble the principal, imprisonment and 
fine, and a ransom, at the king's pleasure." Wise men 
of olden times evidently considered it as ungodly to 
countenance a ''premium on idleness." 

The father of Socialism, Karl Marx, said many years 
ago in his famous treatise, ''Capital": "Capital is a 
dead labor, which vampire-like becomes animated by 
sucking the life-blood of a living labor; and the more 
it consumes the better it thrives." 

At first sight, it appears almost inexplicable how, 
in spite of such relentless prosecutions on the part 
of the law and vehement denunciations on the part of 
science, the income on capital, in the shape of interest 
and other forms of "profit," not only survived, but is 
regarded as an essential part of the so-called "vested 
and sacred" rights of property, which may not be 
assailed lightly! 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE Jg 

The natural inference is that there must be a 
weighty reason for such tenacious vitality of a prin- 
ciple once vigorously denounced, and now religiously 
upheld. The explanation is simple. Property and 
profit are near relations: the one is the parent of the 
other. By denying property we would have to deny 
its offspring, profits; and vice-versa. On the other 
hand, by accepting the right of private property, we 
must also accept the right to derive profits therefrom. 
To deny the owner the right to derive profit from his 
property would be as senseless as to deny the farmer 
the right to milk his cow or to gather apples from his 
apple trees. 

There is still another reason why an income on 
capital has been universally accepted. It rests upon 
the assumption that an accumulation of capital, at 
least in the beginning, is the result of frugality, of 
saving, and the product of one's own labor. As such 
it is entitled to a reward, which the owner may re- 
ceive in the shape of an "income." 

Either of the reasons mentioned is sufficient for a 
complete justification of an income on capital. The 
people, having instinctively realized this, have sanc- 
tioned such an income with the seal of their approval, 
in spite of the vigorous efforts of both law and sci- 
ence to drive it out of existence. 

Unfortunately, the people have failed to recognize 
that in this, as in everything else in this world, there 
should be a LIMIT, which may not be transgressed 
with impunity. Because, like his parent property, in- 



6o KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

come on capital is, within certain limits, a blessing, 
and, beyond them, a withering blight. 

LIMITED INHERITANCE IS ALSO 
JUSTIFIABLE 

Let us imagine that Masr. ^vvynne's father, an 
industrious business man, had succeeded in accumulat- 
ing a small fortune of $100,000, after many years of 
arduous labor and self-denial. Then he became old 
and unable to work any longer. Was he not entitled 
to retire from business, to rest, and reap the reward 
for his past labor by drawing an income on his well- 
earned capital? The answer is plain : he certainly was 
entitled to such a reward. Society could not possibly 
deny an aged workman the privilege of investing his 
savings in any way he might have chosen, and to de- 
rive profits from them. 

In the course of time our friend, the aged workman, 
died, leaving his hard-earned $100,000 to his only son, 
Alfred Gwynne. Alfred, being a prudent youth, in- 
vested his inheritance into the above described lace 
factory, and, having performed this solitary act of 
business, he also retired from business, resting on his 
father's laurels, and reaping, to this day, a reward for 
his father's "dead labor" by exploiting two sets of 
"living labor" to the extent of $6,000 per annum. 

Now we find ourselves in a dilemma which is quite 
perplexing. We have remarked, in the case of Master 
.Gwynne, that his butterfly existence at the expense of 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 61 

the labor of two groups of hard-working men is unjust, 
to say the least. On the other hand, we have been 
compelled to admit, in the case of his father, that an 
aged workman has an unquestionable right to enjoy 
the proceeds of his life-long toil. Should we then 
deny the aged workman the privilege of bequeathing 
his savings to his son? Or should we deny Master 
Gwynne the privilege to inherit and enjoy the pro- 
ceeds of his father's labor? Neither course may be 
pursued with any degree of reason. The father, no 
doubt, had toiled and saved with the view of providing 
for the future welfare of his son. Any animal, bird 
or insect, led only by instinct, provides for its young. 
Surely man, the peer of creation, may not be denied 
the same privilege. Hence a child also may not be 
denied the right to enjoy and profit by the proceeds 
of his father's labor and forethought. Such a right is 
a sequence to his father's privilege : by denying either 
we would have to deny both. 

Therefore, upholding the right of private property, 
we must concede to the owners of said property the 
privilege of drawing a reasonable income from it, 
either for themselves or in the person of their heirs. 

In the latter case we have to reluctantly accept the 
inevitable evil of the existence of human parasites, un- 
worthy heirs to the accumulations of "dead labor," 
mercilessly exploiting ''living labor"; the too-often 
worthless sons of worthy fathers. 



62 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



NECESSARY EVIL NEED NOT BECOME 
UNLIMITED EVIL 

Having been compelled to admit an evil, we are 
under no obligation to legalize unlimited evil. 

We may permit Alfred Gwynne and his kind the 
undisturbed ownership of private property worth, say, 
$250,000, more or less, from which they may derive 
and enjoy a REASONABLE AMOUNT OF UN- 
EARNED PROFITS. But let there be some LIMIT. 
Man's right to the enjoyment of a comfortable income, 
whether from saved or inherited capital, cannot be 
denied; neither can be disputed the privilege to suit- 
ably provide for one's children. But to go beyond a 
certain reasonable limit, and to legalize unlimited un- 
earned profits, is a grave injustice to those faithful 
workers who everlastingly toil for the benefit of a 
capitalist. 

It is true that, when we recognized the property- 
right of a farmer to his apple orchard, we agreed that 
it would be senseless to deny him the privilege of 
gathering apples from his apple trees. Yet would it 
not be still more injudicious to allow a particularly 
clever farmer to acquire the right of property to all 
the apple orchards in the land, and to grant him the 
exclusive privilege of gathering and selling for profit 
all the apples to be had in the United States? Is it 
not exactly the same Special Privilege which was un- 
wisely granted by us to various individuals in regard 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 63 

to our public utilities, such as oil, coal, sugar, to- 
bacco, etc.? 



AMERICAN BACCHANALIA OF PROFIT- 
GATHERING 

Nowhere on earth can be observed such enormous^ 
profit gathering by business millionaires and their 
families and heirs as in the United States. Countless 
millions of dollars, earned, as was explained, by hosts 
of American wage-workers, are gathered up and most- 
ly reinvested by said millionaires to gather new profits, 
while a considerable part is lavishly squandered on 
such unprofitable and unworthy enterprises as the re- 
building of castles for debilitated European nobility, 
furnishing the said nobility with the means for lead- 
ing a life of idle dissipation, etc. 

There are scores of American women, daughters of 
millionaires, who have traded hard-earned American 
dollars for silly titles and a life of apparent glitter, 
and, too often, of real misery. A great many of these 
woebegone duchesses, countesses, and other "ladies," 
are at present either divorced or simply "separated" 
from their original husbands, some of them having pur- 
chased the second edition of a titled lord. 

One of the most prominent among the title-hunting 
heiresses of New York is reputed to be the richest 
young woman in the world, having inherited a for- 
tune of $25,000,000. Another duchess from America 
is rich enough to have purchased a "quiet" separation 



64 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

from her duke, by assigning to his lordship an an- 
nuity of $100,000, to be paid to him in good American 
dollars every year, as long as he graces this world 
with his ornamental presence. In other words, by this 
action of "her highness" her ex-lord will be the lawful 
recipient, for many years to come, of the proceeds of 
the annual labor of at least one thousand American 
workers, who will labor exclusively for him, in ex- 
actly the same way as their brethren were shown to 
toil for the benefit of the owner of the lace factory, 
and as the numberless other American wage-workers 
are toiling for the benefit of a British Astor, of a homi- 
cidal lunatic Harry Thav/, and of many other human 
drones. 

An absentee King of Wealth, who contemptuously 
spurned American citizenship in order to become a 
"subject" to British Majesty, is, thanks to that time- 
worn iniquity, the right to unlimited private property, 
gathering a ceaseless stream of unearned profits from 
his immense business properties in the city of New 
York (mostly high-priced hotels, apartment houses, 
etc.). It is conservatively estimated that he receives 
annually twelve million dollars,— ONE MILLION A 
MONTH, — in absolutely unearned profits (Would it 
not be laughable to call them earned?) and expends 
them munificently in entertaining British royalty and 
its glittering satellites. Meanwhile in America these 
profits, before they are shipped across the ocean, are 
earned by the actual toil of at least 50,000 American 
wage-workers. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 65 

Another glaring specimen of an idle millionaire-by- 
inheritance, supported by the labor of many thou- 
sands of Americans, is a young man who has inherited 
from his father the snug fortune of $100,000,000, mostly 
in profitable Central Railroad bonds and stocks. His 
annual income (obviously unearned by him) amounts 
to many millions of dollars, and enables him to in- 
dulge in the pastimes of costly coaching exercises, ex- 
pensive love-affairs, and other similarly questionable 
activities. The evil admitted by us in the case of 
the young owner of that imaginary lace factory, in 
this case is multiplied many thousands of times, be- 
coming a truly UNLIMITED EVIL. 

PROFITS OF A CAPITALIST ARE ALWAYS 
UNEARNED 

To say that the profits of a capitalist are always un- 
earned does not sound as a statement embodying 
truth ; yet such is the case, as we shall presently see. 

In Master Gwynne, the British Astor, and the title- 
hunting heiresses, we have exposed for observation the 
male and female idlers who are enjoying the special 
privilege of drawing obviously unearned profits. The 
injustice to actual workmen, who earn these profits 
and support the idlers by their labor, was rendered 
thus more palpable and emphatic. But, as a matter 
of fact, the personality of a capitalist does not alter 
the nature of any income on capital, which is AL- 
WAYS UNEARNED, or rather earned by the labor 
of someone else. 



66 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

We may imagine Master Gwynne as an industrious 
and talented young man, assuming the duties of his 
factory manager and becoming an active head of the 
concern. In such a case he would earn his manager's 
salary in addition to his unearned profits, so that, if 
such a salary were $2,000, his total income would rise 
to $8,000 ($6,000 plus $2,000), the unearned profits 
remaining the same. 

It seems plain that a capitalist can never earn his 
profits. He may, however, increase them, and, if such 
increase should be due to his talents and industry, his 
salary should also be increased, as an adequate com- 
pensation for his able management. But the profits 
from his business he does not earn: they are earned 
for him by the combination of his capital (dead labor) 
and his employees (living labor). 

Therefore, were the capitalist the most gifted, en- 
terprising and persevering person, his privilege to ap- 
propriate for himself all the profits earned by the ma- 
chinery and by actual laborers may be conceded only 
as an expedient and within certain limits, but not other- 
wise. 

The fact that modern captains of industry are not 
as worthless as Master Gwynne, and that many of 
them aT-e highly talented and deserving, does not jus- 
tify their wholesale appropriation of the fruits of the 
labor of others. The Father of Trusts, for instance, 
was certainly entitled to, and fully earned, a large re- 
muneration for having devoted his unquestionable 
genius to the development of the oil industry of this 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE (ij 

country. But no stretch of the imagination and no 
amount of sophistry can reconcile one to the idea that 
he is now earning the enormous profits, amounting to 
$50,000,000 (A MILLION A WEEK), derived from 
innumerable industries in which his immense accumu- 
lations have been invested, reinvested, and again rein- 
vested. It should also be remembered that this stu- 
pendous income of "a million a week" does not drop 
from the skies, but is actually earned for him by his 
inanimate oil pipes, mines, mills, shipping, etc., and 
by the daily toil of an army of over 100,000 employees, 
whose average share is the usual "existence" wages of 
$9 a week. Indeed, it is an "evil on a large scale" ! 

Unfortunately, this particular billionaire is not the 
only one in the business of exploiting by the whole- 
sale. The fathers of the afore-mentioned title-hunting 
heiresses are doing the same. They are busily engaged 
in piling profits on profits, millions on millions, by all 
means within their reach, whether fair or foul ; by 
liberal watering of their stocks; by gentlemen's (?) 
agreements ; by cheating the Government of taxes ; by 
getting indicted one day and whitewashed the next; 
in short, by fleecing American lambs vigorously and 
incessantly. 

These opulent gentlemen, veritable Kings of Wealth, 
scarcely 5,000 in number, have thus far amassed an 
enormous "private wealth," which in its volume equals 
the total combined wealth of twenty-six States of the 
Union, counting public and private land, buildings, 
mines, forests, everything. They have rendered the 



68 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

equitable distribution of American wealth an object 
for ridicule. 

Meanwhile, the people, being unable to trace the 
present deplorable condition to its primary cause, are 
wondering why is it that, in spite of the presence 
of all the requisites necessary for creating prosperity, 
the unemployment and poverty are chronic among 
them ; the army of tramps on the increase ; and in the 
cities many thousands are officially reported as slowly 
starving from "under-nourishment" ! 

[WORKERS ARE EXCLUDED FROM PARTICI- 
PATION IN PROFITS 

We have seen that in America only one person in a 
thousand is enjoying the privilege of living on the 
profits from his capital ; while the remaining 999 citi- 
zens are dependent on their wages for a livelihood. 
The only hope for the latter to ever emerge from a 
state of continuous need and dependence lies in the 
possibility of their acquiring a share in that other 
huge channel of wealth. Profits. Such a possibility is 
not recognized by Socialistic doctrine, which flatly de- 
clares that all private profits should be abolished. 
But as long as profits from private business proper- 
ties are "a. condition, not a theory," the people should 
strive to get a just and equitable share in this part of 
their national wealth. In vain, though, would they 
cast their wistful eyes over the entire field of profitable 
industries; they will find everywhere industries ap- 
propriated, and in most cases monopolized outright, by 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 69 

the select few, to whom all the profits flow unrestrain- 
edly and in a ceaseless stream. Nothing is left for 
them but their existence-level wages to thrive upon. 
A hopeless and a cheerless prospect for many in this 
land of apparent plenty ! 

The absence of any limit to private holdings gives 
to any capitalist a legal right to expend a large amount 
of his "profits" derived from American industries, and 
still reach for more and more. Meanwhile, the ma- 
jority of American people are thus driven further and 
further into a condition of poverty and dependence. 

We have seen that the immense channels of Wages 
and Profits are approximately of equal volume. Yet 
more than 90% of our population are completely ex- 
cluded from any participation in the channel of Profits ; 
they are denied any share in the enormous amount of 
business "profits" WHICH THEY ACTUALLY 
EARN, BUT RECEIVE NOT. Is it any wonder that 
they look to Socialism for relief? Why should they, 
though, when it is within their power to enact a simple 
and just Law of Limited Ownership, and thereby open 
for millions of Americans an equal opportunity of 
sharing in the common industrial' wealth of this na- 
tion? 



LET EVERYONE GET WHAT HE DESERVES 

The policy of society should be to treat all equitably, 
rich or poor alike, doing injury to no one. The aim 
should be to let all get what he deserves, whether a 



70 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

man be a genius like Thomas Edison, a hero like 
George Dewey, or a colossus of the industrial world 
like John D. Rockefeller ; or last, — but not the least, — > 
an everyday humble worker, without either genius or 
any particular ability. 

Let all get what they are worth to society, what 
they earn and deserve. And let no one suffer ; let the 
weak be protected from the encroachments of the 
strong; let no one be abandoned to starve in this land 
of plenty. 

At the present time the reward given is out of pro- 
portion to the services rendered, or even to the merits 
of the recipient. Mr. Edison is said to have been 
well rewarded by society, but it is safe to assume that 
his fortune is as nothing in comparison with the 
dazzling business properties of many idle millionaires- 
by-inheritance. Admiral Dewey is receiving from his 
grateful countrymen the modest salary of $13,000 per 
annum. At the same time Mr. Rockefeller is granted 
the monstrous privilege of drawing upon them an- 
nually for over $50,000,000 of "unearned profits." 
Thus, judging by the size of the reward, Mr. Rocke- 
feller is more valuable to this land than one thousand 
geniuses like Thomas Edison, or five thousand heroes 
like George Dewey. Truly, the reward is incompati- 
ble with merit. 

As regards the forgotten and neglected humble 
wage-worker, — who, by the bye, comprises no less than 
99% of the population, — he receives for his everlasting 
toil a pittance of $9 a week for a family of five, and 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 7^ 

is paternally reminded that he must be thankful for 
receiving as much, because his fellow workers in Eu- 
rope are receiving even less than he does. MISERY 
MUST BE CONSOLED BY THE KNOWLEDGE 
OF THE CO-EXISTENCE OF DEEPER MISERY. 

Such an obviously unjust and deplorable condition 
of our country must not be allowed to continue: the 
majority of the population must not be suffered to 
merely exist on semi-starvation wages, while a few in- 
dividuals are granted a Special Privilege to "grab-as- 
you-please" and to luxuriate on "unearned profits." 

The people may concede, as an expedient, to any 
capitalist, whether active or idle, the privilege to ac- 
quire, own and profit by a reasonable amount of pri- 
vate property; but under no circumstances should such 
property remain unreasonably unlimited; for in such 
a case the equitable distribution of American wealth 
will forever remain an unattainable myth. 

Nothing but a direct limitation by law of private 
ownership of wealth will ever throw open to the people 
the participation in that immense channel, Profits, 
which comprises one-half of the wealth of this nation 
and is at the present time in complete possession of 
the few Kings of Wealth. 



^2 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

CHAPTER IV 
Private Monopoly — Foe to Civilization 

ENIGMA OF PROGRESS AND POVERTY 

To the nineteenth century belongs the credit for the 
invention and application of innumerable labor-saving 
machines and devices. A magnificent industrial de- 
velopment was the natural result of these achieve- 
ments. Yet the venerable Alfred Russell Wallace re- 
marks, with excellent reason : "It is the crowning dis- 
grace of the nineteenth century that, with a hundred- 
fold increase in our power of wealth production, — ade- 
quate to abundantly supply every rational want of our 
entire population, — the workers are, on the average, 
as deeply sunk in poverty and misery as before." This 
is the grave enigma of "Progress and Poverty," as yet 
unsolved. 

To the people generally, and to the American people 
in particular, belongs the credit for exercising their 
inventive genius in the right way, and also the dis- 
credit for displaying but a limited sagacity when they 
permitted the incalculable benefits and profits, result- 
ing from great inventions, to flow unrestrainedly in 
the wrong direction : not to the people, as they should 
have ; but away from the people, and to a few specially 
privileged individuals, who have thus easily monopo- 
lized all the important industries of the land. 

The task of the twentieth century is plain. It must 



,THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 73 

rectify the grievous error of its predecessor: it must 
reclaim for the people the benefits which by right be- 
long to them, and which are the natural result of the 
onward march of human progress. 

As the distribution of wealth is that fateful rock 
upon which the nations of the world have invariably 
been wrecked, it is imperative to examine it thor- 
oughly, and the first step should be — to ascertain 
whether commodities can be produced in very large 
and constantly increasing quantities, and, if so, then 
whether they can be so directed as to find their way 
to the largest possible number of persons, and eventu- 
ally to the entire population of any country? 

MARVELS OF MODERN PRODUCTION 

The mission of industrial inventions is to make 
production easier and the things produced plentiful 
and accessible to the people at large. The first of 
these aims has been attained to perfection : the things 
we need are produced with almost incredible ease. 
For instance, a shoemaker requires one hour to sew 
soles by hand ; with the help of a McKay sewing 
machine he can do it in one minute, sewing in a 
single operation through the outsole, insole and up- 
per. This part of shoemaking has thus been rendered 
sixty times easier than it was heretofore. Are our 
shoes sixty times cheaper? 

Adam Smith was lost in admiration at the progress 
in the pin-making industry of his time, when one 



74 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

workman could make five thousand pins a day. At 
the present time one workman, attending twelve auto- 
matic machines, turns out a million pins a day. The 
art of pin-making has been made two hundred times 
more effective. 

Our grandmothers' knitting needles were working 
overtime producing one pair of stockings a week. 
To-day one person's labor of eight minutes on a knit- 
ting machine completes a pair. This is two hundred 
and fifty times as fast as with the knitting needles 
wielded by hand. Are our stockings 250 times 
cheaper than they were before? 

Leather used to be tanned by being first soaked in 
a weak solution of hemlock for a week; then in pits 
of a stronger solution for six weeks ; then in "lay- 
aways" for another six weeks ; and so on, until it took, 
in all, six months to make good leather. To-day, with 
the help of chemicals, even the thickest hide can be 
tanned in three hours! A wonderful progress! The 
leather tanning is four hundred times easier than it 
was before. Surely the leather we purchase now is not 
400 times cheaper than it was before. 

A yard of the finest Brussels or velvet carpet comes 
out of the power loom every ten minutes! 

With the help of modern machinery, nine minutes* 
work of one man produces a bushel of wheat, from 
plowing to harvest ! 

It would be tedious to recount all the marvels of 
modern production. The few instances quoted are 
sufficient for our purpose of demonstrating the great 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 75 

facility and immense reduction in the cost of modern 
production. All commodities affected, — and what are 
not affected? — are being produced at least one hun- 
dred times easier than half a century ago, and, natu- 
rally, their cost of production is correspondingly 
smaller. 



PRODUCTION CHEAPER— PRICES ARTI- 
FICIALLY HIGHER 

Commodities so easily produced should be as plenti- 
ful as the leaves on trees, or the sand on the beach, 
or even air itself; for they can be produced in limitless 
quantities and at a trifling cost. Is it not natural to 
suppose that they should be accessible to everybody 
and sold at prices so low that even the humblest 
would be able to acquire and enjoy them? Such 
should be the natural result of the progress in the 
methods of production. 

It is incredible, yet true, that actually the reverse 
condition is observable all around us. Those very 
commodities which are so easily and cheaply produced 
are very expensive and practically scarce; the major* 
ity of the people are in constant need of them, while 
a great many, owing to almost prohibitive prices, are 
compelled to get along without them. 

Instead of the gradual cheapening of the goods, 
thanks to the advance of civilization and centraliza- 
tion of industries; instead of the comforts and even 
luxuries becoming the common property of all the 



76 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

people — the comforts and pleasures of life are growing 
inaccessible for the majority of the people, who have 
to deny themselves even proper nourishment and 
clothing, owing to the prevalent high prices. 

Millions of Americans are no better off than was 
Tantalus, who, with an abundance of food and water 
around him, was slowly perishing from hunger and 
thirst! 

In the recent Report of the Department of Com- 
merce and Labor, where the prices of 257 commodi- 
ties were taken into consideration, the present cost of 
living has been found to be the highest ever known 
in the history of this country. It is still rising, and 
to-day it is sixty-five per cent, higher than it was 
seventeen years ago. 

How can such contradictory phenomena be recon- 
ciled? A great reduction in the cost of production 
and the equally great increase in the prices of things 
produced? A grave riddle, indeed. It must have a 
better solution than the puerile prattle about the abun- 
dance of gold production, the extravagance of the 
people (on $9 a week!), etc. 

It would be absurd to assume that the goods have 
naturally advanced in price in spite of the marvellous 
decrease in the cost of their production. And, as the 
progress is observed in every branch of production, — 
from raising an ear of corn to building a battleship, — 
the present high prices cannot be explained by natural 
causes: they have been brought about ARTIFI- 
CIALLY! 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ^y 

The factor that is instrumental in such an artificial 
raising of the prices of commodities ; that is guilty of 
the perversion of the natural order of things ; that has 
deprived the majority of the American people of their 
indisputable right to participate in the benefits derived 
from the progress in labor-saving machinery — is in- 
deed inimical to the welfare of the people. 

A REACTIONARY FORCE STOPS PROGRESS 
OF CIVILIZATION 

Naturally, progress in the methods of production 
must result in a cheapening of the prices of every- 
thing, and in the consequent spreading of more and 
more comfort among the mass of the people. The 
mission of progress can be nothing else. Its aim 
should be to bring the full enjoyment of life to an ever 
larger and larger number of men until it reaches at 
last all the people, without a single exception. Such 
must be the mission of civilization and progress; 
otherwise our boasted civilization is a fraud and a 
mockery ! 

But it is in the power of a certain reactionary force 
to sidetrack the onward march of progress so as to 
make it drift from the many to the few. Obviously it 
has done so in the United States of America; it has 
effectually and almost completely diverted from the 
majority of the American people the immense benefits 
and profits resulting from the invention of innumerable 
labor-saving devices. 



78 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

To so deprive many millions of persons of the fruits 
of civilization, of a comfortable life and freedom from 
care to which civilization unquestionably entitles 
them, and to plunge them, instead, into an abyss of 
continuous struggle with poverty and misery, is cer- 
tainly a grave trespass upon the rights and well-being 
of the people. 

We shall see who is THE TRESPASSER. 



AMERICANS ARE PAYING MILLIONS IN 
TRIBUTE 

When the arrogant Directory of France refused to 
receive American ambassadors unless the United 
States promised to pay a tribute of a quarter of a 
million of dollars, the leader of the would-be ambas- 
sadors, Charles Co Pinkney, gave this memorable re- 
ply: "Millions for defense, but not a cent for tribute." 
The rejected ambassadors left France, and the haughty 
Directory had ample leisure for pondering over the 
spirited rejoinder of the freedom-loving citizens. 

This happened a little over a hundred years ago. 
Yet what a sad change has been wrought over this 
land in such a comparatively short period of time! 
How deeply grieved the patriot Pinkney would 
have been could he have foreseen that his be- 
loved country would so soon become the easy 
prey of an artful foe, who would successfully 
exact from the American people a much heavier 
tribute than a paltry quarter of a million, in 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 79 

fact, countless millions of dollars, and would collect 
that tribute over and over again in the shape of a direct 
taxation on the very necessaries of life. 

The early history of our country is repeating itself. 
Once more a "taxation without representation" is 
taking place, and is being levied in the same manner 
as of yore, — by a superior force. But, unlike olden 
times, we are to all appearances quite indifferent to 
the fact. We do not even clearly realize that such a 
taxation is taking place. Although very far from 
being comfortable, we are unconscious of the primary 
cause of our discomfort : we do not perceive the bane- 
ful influence exercised upon our social well-being by 
the all-powerful enemy who is taxing us so unmer- 
cifully. 

WHO IS THE ENEMY? 

Our forefathers were peremptorily ordered to pay a 
certain tribute to His Majesty the King of England 
and his royal nobility. They refused to do so, and, 
upon repeated attempts to enforce the payments, they 
rose in their wrath and gave the Boston tea party^ 
followed by the battles of Lexington, Bunker Hill, 
and other manifestations of their angry protest. 

It was comparatively easy for the American pion- 
eers in the cause of freedom to assume the disguise 
of savages and throw the tea overboard, for there was 
the culpable tea to be disposed of. Similarly, it was 
a patriotic yet an obvious task to gather minute men 



Bo KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

and fight the redcoats: for there were the redcoats 
in person to be shot at. 

To-day it is quite different. Nothing- to throw 
overboard; no one to shoot at. The enemy is not in 
sight. We only guess that there must be an enemy, 
for we feel the results of his machinations. But the 
crafty one is hiding himself so skilfully that whatever 
is seen of him appears as indistinct and unassailable 
as a phantom. 

To-day we are not ordered to pay any tribute. Far 
from it ; we are suavely led to believe that we are pay- 
ing tribute to no one ; at the same time we are quietly 
made to pay it, having been gradually reduced to a 
condition in which, in order to maintain our physical 
existence, we must pay a perpetual tribute, in high 
prices, to a number of our industrial "majesties." 

Thus it has come to pass that, being lulled into a 
belief that we are paying no tribute, we arise neither 
in wrath nor otherwise, but simply keep on paying 
and paying. 

CEASELESS FLOW OF TRIBUTE TO 
MONOPOLISTS 

The second decade of the twentieth century is wit- 
nessing a spectacle of which we, as self-governed 
people, can hardly feel proud: a hundred millions of 
intelligent persons are ensnared and cajoled into pay- 
ing a heavy tribute to a handful of clever monopolists. 
True, the people grumble and argue and fume; but 
pay they must, and pay they surely do. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE gi 

At the expense of the hard-earned wages; at the 
sacrifice of the welfare and comfort of wives and chil- 
dren ; in hard times and in good times ; they are con- 
tinually paying the arbitrary taxes and filling to re- 
pletion the purses of their industrial masters. 

The tribute proposed by France or the tea tax de- 
manded by George III were mere trifles in comparison 
with the burdens under which the American people 
are groaning to-day. 

From the cradle and to the grave; from babyhood 
to old age — American children, women and men are 
paying a ceaseless tribute to the autocratic unlimited 
owners of American industries. An infant in its first 
food pays its first pennies to the milk, cracker and 
other monopolists and trusts; its mother, to sustain 
the strength so needed in her motherhood, must pay 
a heavy tribute to the beef, sugar, coffee, cold-storage, 
and various other trusts ; while its father is compelled 
to pay the heaviest share of all in tribute to the leather, 
coal, oil, tobacco, and other monopolies too numerous 
to mention. 

Should any of the family travel, a tribute is levied 
on them by the railroad, Pullman Car, express, and 
other "road agents" ; should they seek amusement, the 
tribute goes to the theatrical, race track, and other 
monopolies; and so on ad infinitum. At last, when 
grim death has overtaken a tribute-payer, his mortal 
remains have to make the final, post-mortem tribute 
payment to the coffin, nail and cemetery monopolies. 

A sheep is fleeced but once a year; the American 



82 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

lamb is shorn daily, all the year around, even unto 
death. 

TRUSTS ARE ADVANCE GUARDS OF 
CIVILIZATION 

American people, actuated by the seldom erring in- 
stinct of a multitude, designate their invisible foe and 
tribute-taker under the general name of "Trusts." 

Trusts are combinations of large industrial bodies, 
dealing in the same kind of commodities, and pos- 
sessing largely the control of the markets, of the out- 
put, prices, etc. Yet, if properly directed, they are 
far from being objectionable. In fact, they are de- 
signed to be highly beneficial to the people at large. 
To abolish them would be equivalent to taking a step 
backward on the path of civilization. 

Strange as it may seem to those who are so deeply 
incensed against them, trusts are meant to be, — and 
under natural conditions would have been, — the AD- 
VANCE GUARDS OF CIVILIZATION. They can 
be made extremely beneficial agents under civiliza- 
tion's command. 

The most economic processes of production and dis- 
tribution and the almost entire elimination of harmful 
waste were made possible only by application of a 
practical principle of combination. This principle is 
perfected in the trusts and is often indispensable for 
lessening the cost of production and for a consequent 
spread of prosperity among the people. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 83 

The odium attached to the word "trusts," which 
makes them hateful to the popular mind, is not due 
to the fact that they are perfected combinations, but to 
the exercise of the great monopoly power to the detri- 
ment of the people, instead of to their advantage. 

It is not the nature of combinations, or the union 
of combinations called "trusts," that is objectionable; 
but the force which guides them to do evil instead of 
good. 

THE SOULS OF TRUSTS ARE GUILTY 

It is curious to note that, although much has been 
said about this trust question, and all possible pros 
and contras were advanced, the most essential part 
of the whole has ever been passed unnoticed, namely, 
that trusts are only convenient instruments in the 
hands of those eminently gifted individuals who own 
and direct them; who may, with reason, be con- 
sidered as THE SOULS OF TRUSTS; and who, 
however unconsciously or unwittingly, are the prime 
movers of all the evil perpetrated by modern trusts. 

Trusts have, as a rule, only a few influential stock- 
holders. Although in some cases, when the popular 
game of "watering" the stock had been resorted to, 
a number of persons were "taken in," but they are 
hardly more important than if they were a set of 
wooden dummies. The complete control and mastery 
of the affairs of trusts rests, without exception, with 
a very few, at most a dozen, of the principal stock- 



84 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

holders whose holdings often run into many millions 
of dollars. These are the dominating spirits, the real 
lords of industries, who wield the dangerous power of 
private monopoly at their discretion and direct the 
energies of trusts to good or evil, as they choose. 

These industrial leaders, the Kings of Wealth, with 
all their undeniable talents and often genius, are, un- 
fortunately for the people, actuated in their actions not 
by the desire to serve the public good, but by the 
seemingly incurable mania of self-aggrandizement. 
Spurred by it, they pervert the noble and beneficent 
mission of combinations and trusts, — to serve the 
people, — into the petty and ignoble aim of serving the 
few and enriching them at the expense of the people. 

It is important to bear this in mind, as it is the key 
to the deplorable condition of the modern industrial 
world. 

MONOPOLISTIC SHAREHOLDING ILLUS- 
TRATED 

The "Big Six," as the beef trust is called in the 
official Report of the Commissioner on Corporations, 
consists of Armour & Co., Swift & Co., Cudahy Co., 
National Packing Co., and two others. The Commis- 
sioner says: "They are the only shippers of dressed 
beef in America, the private monopoly in this line 
being complete." The stock ownership in the Ar- 
mour & Co., as given in the report, is very simple: 
J. Ogden Armour and his family OWN ALL THE 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 85 

STOCK, It is the principal company of the now 
notorious "Beef Trust." In addition to this, the Ar- 
mours own outright, or completely control, a number 
of other concerns comprising the combination. 

The National Packing Company is owned by three 
families, in the following ratio: The Armours, 46% 
of the stock; the Swifts, 42%, and the Morrises, 
12%. 

The number of stockholders in the Cudahy Com- 
pany, as reported to the State of Kansas, consists of 
eight persons. As the capitalization of the company 
is (un-watered) eight millions of dollars, an average 
shareholding in this branch of the beef trust is one 
million for each of the eight owners. 

The Commissioner concludes with this remark: 
"The stock of all these companies is very closely 
held, the principal stockholders being members of 
respective families, except for a small amount of scat- 
tered stock." 

Thus, the beef industry of these United States is 
a FAMILY AFFAIR of Armours, Swifts, Morrises, 
and a few others. 

Is it any wonder that the price of meat for our 
consumption is soaring sky high? It is "fixed" for 
us by an all-powerful "family." 

TOBACCO, RAILROAD AND STEEL KINGS 

In the Report of the Commissioner of Corporations 
on the Tobacco Industry we find : The American To- 
bacco Company stands in a controlling position over 



86 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

the entire tobacco combination (tobacco trust), with 
its eighty-six companies. The control of the American 
Tobacco Company itself rests in the hands of a very 
few persons: ten largest stockholders hold together 
sixty per cent, of the entire capitalization. These 
"Big Ten" are "dominating the entire combination." 
Then the Commissioner gives the familiar names of 
ten autocrats of the tobacco industry of the American 
people: J. B. Duke, T. F. Ryan, O. H. Payne, and 
others. He adds : "These ten millionaire stockholders 
own two hundred and seventy thousand shares, 
valued at $135,000,000." A handsome average of thir- 
teen million and a half for each of the owners and 
rulers of the American tobacco industry. Again a 
family affair! 

In regard to the railroads of our country, we learn 
from another Commissioner, on Interstate Commerce, 
that "About one hundred persons are controlling all 
the railroads, whose capitalization reaches thirteen bil- 
lions, and the net earnings, distributed in dividends, 
exceed two hundred and twenty millions per annum." 
A nice slice of the national wealth surrendered, uncon- 
ditionally, to the mercies of the "Big Hundred" of 
the railroad world! 

But there are still bigger fish in the American indus- 
trial pond. For instance, the steel trust is ruled by 
"Interests," whose shareholding is immense. A promi- 
nent official, interviewed recently upon the subject, 
said that, in his opinion, individual holdings in the 
steel combination are not large. "No one man," said 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 87 

he, ''owns in the United States Steel Corporation more 
than 250,000 shares, worth only $25,000,000." 

Andrew Carnegie held "only" $50,000,000 worth of 
shares in his own trust; John D. Rockefeller, the re- 
tired, owns "only" $100,000,000 worth of shares in his 
giant trust. And there are others. 

TRUST OWNERS ARE TWENTIETH CENTURY 
MACHIAVELLIS 

These millionaire stockholders, while managing 
trusts sometimes personally, at other times through 
subordinate "captains of industry," are the real rulers 
of all the important American industries; rulers, not 
in name, but in fact. They may do anything they 
please, and they certainly are exercising their right to 
the utmost. Having once conceded to them the au- 
thority, we may not gainsay them. 

These industrial barons are wielding all the power 
that feudal barons ever possessed, except the right of 
taking our lives directly. They may not with impun- 
ity kill us outright. They may, however, — and they 
certainly do, — take our lives indirectly, by raising to 
a prohibitive figure the prices of all the necessities of 
life. At all events, it is within their power to make 
our lives miserable by creating disastrous pan^'cs, hard 
times, unemployment, etc. In short, the American 
people are at their mercy. To believe that they can 
be "controlled" from Washington is a puerile fancy, 
an obvious absurdity. 



88 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

The most vivid example of the fearful power of the 
trust manipulators was given recently by the all-grasp- 
ing ice trust in the city of New York. It unexpectedly 
advanced the price of ice, in the middle of summer, by 
over ioo%, making its use practically prohibitive for 
the poorer population of the most congested districts 
of the city. The action of this veritable Herod 
of the twentieth century has slain at one stroke 
many thousands of innocent infants. But, as the 
slaughter was done indirectly (and legally), the 
slayer was not outlawed, as in justice he should have 
been. 

All trust owners are not, of course, of this atrocious 
caliber. They are, as a rule, inoffensive and able busi- 
ness men, abiding by the laws of the land, and only 
exercising freely the rights and privileges conferred 
upon them by the people of this free republic. Unfor- 
tunately, being possessed by an almost insane mania 
of accumulating wealth, they hesitate at nothing. Ac- 
cording to their Machiavellian creed, "the end justi- 
fies the means." Their refinement, their qualities as 
gentlemen are set aside, and in their scramble for 
"more wealth" they stoop to bribery, conspiracy, re- 
bating, corruption of officials, perjury, savage cruelty 
toward competitors, and other nefarious means. They 
are, indeed, the twentieth century Machiavellis, striv- 
ing to acquire riches by fair means if possible, by foul 
if necessary. 

This mania of self-aggrandizement has prompted 
them c': late to do their very worst. Forgetting all 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 89 

caution, and oblivious to the dictates of humanity and 
even of common decency, they have launched into a 
heartless and brazen campaign of still further enrich- 
ing themselves at the expense of the American people, 
by impudent stock-watering (which is nothing but a 
theft by wholesale in a legal disguise), and, worst of 
all, by arbitrarily raising the prices of almost all the 
necessaries of life. 

Who else may be held responsible for the misdeeds 
of the trusts, but their helmsmen, the millionaire 
stockholders? The trusts themselves, mere passive 
tools in clever hands, cannot be blamed for the doings 
of their mighty rulers. And it would be senseless 
to demand that trusts be abolished because their rul- 
ers are misdirecting them. A steamer is not put out 
of commission because its captain is found to be a 
wicked man; the principle at the foundation of a sav- 
ings bank is not abandoned because a bank president 
is proven to be a defaulter. There is no better rea- 
son for rejecting the principle of combination than 
in the cited instances of steam locomotion and a sav- 
ings bank. 

Therefore, our task has narrowed to finding the 
means of effectually curbing the monomaniacs who 
own and misdirect the trusts. 

Yet, before proceeding further, it is well to inquire 
whether the trust magnates alone are guilty of the 
offense of raising the prices of the necessaries of life, 
or perhaps some other factors are also responsible for 
committing the same offense. 



90 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

THE REMARKABLE BEEF AUTOCRAT 

Perhaps the cattle-raisers and the "greedy" retailers 
have caused the unwarranted rise in the prices of 
meat designed for consumption by the American 
people? 

Turning to the official investigations, vv^e find that 
the cattle-raisers, far from dictating the prices, have 
themselves complained so persistently of being abused 
by the great beef packers, who, by "fixing" the prices, 
allowed them only a mere pittance for their cattle on 
the hoof, — that the government was forced to thor- 
oughly investigate the matter. Upon said investiga- 
tion it has been proven conclusively that the profits 
allowed the cattle-raisers by the packers were so small 
as to completely exonerate them from the charge of 
extortion. 

As regards the retailing butchers, let them speak 
for themselves. At a recent meeting of the United 
Master Butchers' Association the Secretary of the As- 
sociation, D. J. Haley, said: "The greed of the beef 
trust surpasses all bounds. With this last increase in 
the prices of carcasses the price of beef to-day is the 
highest ever known. These constant increases are 
LITTLE SHORT OF ROBBERY." As far as known, 
Mr. Haley is neither an Anarchist nor Socialist ; he is 
an influential master butcher, and speaks as becomes 
an outraged American citizen. 

But perhaps the trust in question was prompted by 
the danger of facing a loss in business? Very far 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 91 

from it. In the latest report of Armour & Co. the 
net earnings for the last twelvemonth were shown to 
exceed 35.5% of the total capitalization. The Swift & 
Co., the next in order of importance, show for the 
same period a net profit of 13.6% on the capitalization 
of sixty millions, forty millions of which is pure water. 

In spite of such immense profits, bordering on 
usury, the price of meat for our consumption has 
steadily increased within the same period of time by 
over fifty per cent. For this we are obviously in- 
debted to no other cause but the arbitrary mandate 
of the beef autocrat. 

To show further that there has not been a shadow 
of justification for the beef trust to so persistently and 
vigorously increase the prices of meat, it is sufficient 
to take a look at the export figures of American beef. 
The same trust, during the same twelve months, has 
exported to England alone half a billion pounds of 
frozen beef. And, what is still more interesting, this 
exported beef was sold at prices from 25% to 40% 
lower than at home. It is almost unbelievable, yet 
such is the fact. If it pays to export American beef, 
and, moreover, to sell it to the foreigner so much 
cheaper, then by what right, human or divine, do the 
impudent monopolists force us to pay, in America, such 
extortionate prices for our own American beef? 

The latest Census Report shows that within the last 
10 years the population of the United States has in- 
creased 21%; yet during the same period of time the 
meat production by the disheartened cattle-raisers 



92 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

has actually decreased: the number of cattle has de- 
creased by over 3,000,000; sheep, by over 5,000,000, etc. 
Even hogs are decreased in number, although their 
selling value to us, the consumers, has increased by 
over $100,000,000. 

Thus, the more people we have, the less they have 
to eat and the more to pay for what they do eat, — 
thanks to the rapacious beef autocrat. 

Is it not obvious that the cattle-raisers, who receive 
but a small allowance from the trust for their cattle 
on the hoof; the retailing tradesmen and butchers, who 
are steadily driven out of business and are forced to 
become the servile tools of the trust; and the "ex- 
travagant" consumers, the people, who are compelled 
to pay arbitrary and exorbitant prices, — much higher 
than foreigners do, — for what they must purchase; 
— all are unmercifully fleeced by this "family affair," 
the twentieth century wonder, the remarkable Beef 
Autocrat. 

If still further proofs of the high-handed methods 
of the beef trust are necessary, the reader will find 
them in the quoted report. Suffice it to state here 
that it was proven by oral and documentary evidence 
that the heads of various corporations, comprising the 
trust, "held weekly secret meetings, at which they 
arbitrarily fixed the prices of beef, to suit themselves" 
and "checked off competition by means of gentlemen's 
[(?) agreements." 

At the time of writing these lines this remarkably 
easy process of "fixing the prices" of one of the prime 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 93 

necessities of life, — the principal food of the American 
people, — by the trust magnates, "to suit themselves," 
has not by any means ceased, in defiance of scathing 
official denunciations and public indignation; and, if 
anything, it is on the increase. 

COLD STORAGE TRUST CORNERING PERISH- 
ABLE FOOD 

Perhaps our farmer producer is greedy and causes 
the high cost of living by exacting arbitrary prices 
for his products? 

In order to answer this question we must make a 
closer acquaintance with the latest arrival in trust- 
dom, — the Cold Storage Trust. 

There are in the United States over 800 cold-storage 
warehouses, the business of storing food having proved 
highly lucrative. It is needless to say that all have been 
taken in by a giant combine, which has absolute power 
over this nation's supply of the so-called "perishable" 
foods such as beef, butter, eggs, poultry, fruit, vege- 
tables, etc. 

The emissaries of this private monopoly scour the 
country during the summer months, buying in at the 
lowest prices possible all the butter, eggs, poultry, 
etc., and storing them for future use. Later on, this 
trust, emulating the example of Joseph of Egypt, dis- 
poses of its stored wealth at prices advanced some 
two or three hundred per cent. 

In this manner the ingenious cold-storage device, 



^^ 



94 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

meant to benefit the people, is made to serve a private 
monopoly. The cold-storage manipulators grow im- 
mensely rich, while the people can no longer obtain 
cheaply, even in summer, such food as butter, eggs, 
etc., because the trust "corners" all perishable food. 
And when winter arrives the people are expected, as 
a matter of course, to pay "fancy" prices for sup- 
posedly "fancy" butter, eggs, etc. 

More than one hundred and twenty-five millions of 
pounds of butter alone is stored by this particular 
trust during the summer months. The obvious result 
of such a wholesale "cornering" of butter became 
manifest of late, as we are compelled to pay for but- 
ter in the midst of summer the prices we used to pay 
only in midwinter. 

The newcomer is encouraged by the unsavory ex- 
ample of its elder brethren, notably by the all-power- 
ful beef trust; and the older this newest "infant in- 
dustry" grows, the more rapacious it becomes. And 
the end is not yet in sight. Designed to be of ines- 
timable benefit to the American people, it shows al- 
ready a fair promise of speedily developing into a 
mighty fiend among fiends. 

PRIVATE REFRIGERATING CAR MONOPOLY 

In its questionable transactions the cold-storage 
monopoly has an efficient and faithful ally in a private 
refrigerating car trust. This institution is so thor- 
oughly un-American as to require a word of ex- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 95 

planation as regards its position in the industrial 
world. 

There are in use in this country one hundred and 
fifty thousand private refrigerating cars, which are 
chiefly the private property of the all-powerful beef 
trust, but are cheerfully loaned to the allies, for a 
consideration, as the occasion may arise. These pri- 
vate cars are operated on equally "private" lines; but 
they are always made welcome by and given the right 
of way on any railroad in the United States. The 
''special rates" granted to these cars are so low that 
their owners naturally have an immense advantage 
over the common shippers, who have to pay common 
freight rates. 

The legal status of this private car institution is 
only winked at: for some reason it does not appear 
expedient to have them declared illegal. However, 
the Interstate Commerce Commissioner has this to 
say about them : "The gross favoritism and discrimi- 
nation, arising from the use and operation of the pri- 
vate car lines, have caused wide complaint and have 
created an earnest demand for legislation to correct 
such evil." But the "evil" has not been corrected as 
yet. 

With the help of this semi-legal institution, the 
cold-storage trust has the practical monopoly of deal- 
ing in all kinds of food, from a California strawberry 
to a Texas steer. All the fruit we eat, whether it 
grows in Oregon or Georgia, Southern California or 
Northern Maine, comes to us in "private refrigerating 



96 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

cars/' All the turkeys, poultry, eggs, apples, etc., 
come the same way. In short, the monopoly is com- 
plete and far-reaching. The results are obvious. The 
farmer has to abide by what the trust will allow him 
for his produce. His orchard may be overladen with 
fruit, but the abundant crop will surely rot unless he 
consents to the trust's own prices. For he has no 
"private" cars for shipping and the common freight 
rates are too high for shipping at profit. 

The special prices "fixed" for the farmer by the 
trust are so low that orchard after orchard is aban- 
doned and the formerly prosperous orchardist migrates 
to the city to swell the ranks of the unemployed. 
Meanwhile the people are paying for all perishable 
food enormously high prices, which are also "fixed" 
for them by the same trust. 

In this way the cold-storage monopoly does what 
all private monopolies are doing: It fixes the prices 
both for the farmer-producer and for the people-con- 
sumer. It exploits both the farmer and the consumer. 
It kills two birds with one stone. 

BUTTER AND EGG BOARD 

In order to squeeze the farmer thoroughly, yet with 
some display of commercial decency, the cold-storage 
monopoly is keeping on pay a servitor known to the 
people under the name of a Butter and Egg Board of 
Chicago. The principal duty of this commercial 
"fakir" is to issue throughout the country districts 
extremely low quotations, designed for the farmer, not 



tTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 97 

the consumer. Without such "fixed" quotations the 
emissaries of the monopoly might have found farmers 
unprepared to part with the products of their hard 
toil for a mere song; with the help of the bogus quo- 
tations the process of squeezing goes on smoothly and 
uninterruptedly. 

The practices of this accommodating board became 
so audacious that some of the farmers unravelled the 
fraud, and the Government was compelled to step in 
and take the matter into the courts, where it rests at 
the present time. What will be the result remains to 
be seen. 

As the logical outcome of the machinations of this 
monopoly in perishable food, the conditions at the 
present time are both abnormal and highly injurious 
to the comfort and welfare of the American people. 
We find the following striking items recorded in the 
official reports: "During the last fifteen years po- 
tatoes have advanced in price 100%, butter 150%, eggs 
200%, and so on." 

Thus the farmer may also be exonerated from the 
accusation of charging extortionate prices for the 
goods produced by him. On the other hand, the cold- 
storage monopoly and its allies stand guilty of squeez- 
ing both the farmer and the consumer. 

MILK TRUST TAXING AMERICAN BABIES 

Another false servant of the American people, the 
Milk Trust, owning a cold-storage of its own, has 
made several advances in the price of milk lately, and 



98 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

evidently liked the process so well that, when the 
beef, cold-storage and other trusts declared a crusade 
against the people's pocketbook, it joined in the game 
with a will, and raised the price of milk to the top 
notch. But the ''unreasonable" people did not like it, 
milk being an article almost indispensable even in the 
humblest households. They instituted such a loud 
protest that the government had to take notice. The 
Attorney-General of the State of New York has taken 
the matter into the Supreme Court, and has succeeded 
in proving that the transgressor is ''controlling over 
80% of the supply of milk, having practically a mo- 
nopoly, 'fixing' the extremely low prices to be paid 
to the farmer, and correspondingly high prices to be 
exacted from the consumer. . . . The advance in 
price of milk was made solely for providing larger 
dividends for individuals at the expense of the con- 
sumers." 

An official investigation of the books of this trust 
has revealed the following facts : Of the twenty-five 
millions of capitalization of the principal company of 
the trust, fifteen millions were issued in compensa- 
tion for good will, trade marks, etc.; in other words, 
they are water, pure and simple. The net earnings 
for the year ending September 30, 1913, were two mil- 
lion six hundred thousand dollars, making a hand- 
some profit of 28 per cent. In spite of such fine earn- 
i igs, the trust has since advanced the price of milk 
for the consumer by fifteen per cent.! 

This trust has also established an auxiliary institu- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 99 

tion similar to the famous Butter Board of Chicago. 
The name of this concern is the Consolidated Milk 
Exchange. The principal duties of this "Exchange" 
are the usual ''fixing" of the prices which are to be 
paid to the farmer-producer and of another set of en- 
tirely different prices to be demanded from the people, 
the consumer. The first set is three cents and down; 
the second, nine cents and up. The difference, two 
hundred per cent., is presumably a fair "exchange," 
compensating the trust for the labor of bottling and 
distribution. The obviously enormous net profit is 
that milk tax which American babies are called upon 
to contribute to the trust's millionaire shareholders. 

Is it to be wondered at that dairymen find the keep- 
ing of cows unprofitable, and are feeding their hogs 
and chickens with milk rather than sell it to the 
greedy trust at the insignificant "fixed" price gra- 
ciously "allowed" them? The result is apparent: pro- 
duction of milk is lessened and a new reason is ad- 
vanced for a further raise in the price for the con- 
sumer. And the people? Why, they have to pay the 
increased price, or — go without milk. 

Although several of the directors of this infamous 
exchange are under indictment, and the exchange it- 
self had to remove to a neighboring State in order to 
escape further legal prosecution, — the nefarious busi- 
ness still goes on uninterruptedly and is flourishing. 



lOO KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

PRICES DOUBLED AND TREBLED BY THE 
TRUSTS 

By similar methods and in like manner numerous 
trusts, which have sprung into existence within the 
last few years, are taxing the people without mercy. 
Their "little short of robbery" tactics have been 
crowned with complete success. A biased Congress 
gave them a whitewash immunity bath, learned sci- 
entists having proclaimed them only partially guilty, 
laying the chief blame for high prices on the supposi- 
titious abundance of gold and other "scientific" causes. 
Meanwhile, the prices have been steadily going up and 
up to such a surprising degree that where formerly 
we paid one dollar to-day we are compelled to pay two 
or three dollars. For instance, we used to pay for a 
keg of wire nails $1.35, but, with the advent of a nail 
trust, the price went up to $3.60; barb-wire has ad- 
vanced, per 100 lbs., from $1.65 to $4.25; tin plate, 
per box, from $2.80 to $4.85; window glass, per box, 
from $1.75 to $5.00; and so on. On the average the 
prices of all these "protected" trust commodities have 
increased by 175 per cent. 

Seventeen years ago the American people, led by 
the famous Mark Hanna and other trust organizers, 
indulged in a triumphant refrain: "When November 
comes around no 50-cent dollar will be found." Seven- 
teen Novembers have since arrived and passed, and 
behold — a forty-cent dollar has been found. As the 
prices have advanced by over 60 per cent., the pur- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE loi 

chasing value of a dollar is to-day only 40 cents, in 
comparison with what it was seventeen years ago. 

An excellent explanation of the source of some of 
the advances in prices is presented by a bit of interest- 
ing information, freely circulated some time ago. It 
was reported that the powerful steel "interests," while 
forming a huge combine, bought off a competitor, Vul- 
can Mills, by agreeing to pay annually a quarter of a 
million of dollars for not making steel rails. An in- 
teresting bargain, whose sequel is obvious. In order 
to be able to pay annually that quarter of a million 
the steel trust had to resort to an extra-liberal "fix- 
ing" of the prices, so that the consumer would foot up 
the bill and also enable the trust to make a handsome 
profit on the transaction. 

MODERN HOLOCAUST OF COFFEE 

The means by which some of the trusts are achiev- 
ing their ends are highly original, to say the least. 
In this connection the most striking instance was pre- 
sented recently by a truly astonishing coffee deal con- 
summated in Brazil. 

Coffee, a favorite beverage of the American people, 
became so cheap, owing to a great demand for it, that 
the coffee interests took alarm lest their dividends 
might decrease. They put their heads together and 
concocted a scheme the like of which had never been 
witnessed in this world of ours. They succeeded in 
entangling the largest of the coffee-producing States 



I02 KINGS OF WEALTH VS\ 

of Brazil, the State of San Paulo, into a coffee loan 
of $75,000,000. Once the victim was financially en- 
trapped the rest became easy. Burdened with a heavy 
bonded obligation, the government of San Paulo had 
to agree with the coffee interests to limit the export 
of coffee to the United States to ten million bags a 
year. Of course, the price of coffee in the United 
States immediately went up, and is as high as it pos- 
sibly could be. 

Some of the coffee planters, who had not been con- 
sulted in regard to this deal, advanced very vigorous 
objections. To pacify them the government decided, 
upon another consultation with their bonded masters, 
to choose a lesser evil, namely, to purchase from the 
planters their total output, and then— TO BURN ALL 
COFFEE IN EXCESS OF THE STIPULATED 
10,000,000 BAGS. 

By this now famous scheme, called a valorization 
trick, Arbuckle and his associate coffee barons suc- 
ceeded not only in dictating to an independent state 
(which, in itself, shows the marvelous power of a 
private monopoly), but also actually LIMITED THE 
INDUSTRY OF ONE COUNTRY, IN ORDER TO 
CREATE A SCARCITY OF COFFEE IN THE 
OTHER COUNTRY. Will Uncle Sam slumber 
peacefully much longer? 

Our fellow-sufferer, the Brazilian coffee planter, is 
thus graciously permitted to continue his plantation 
labors, but he has the humiliation of eventually wit- 
nessing the wanton destruction of the coffee which he 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 103 

had raised, picked and carried to the seaport, for no 
better a purpose than to go up in smoke. 

Commenting upon this surprising deal, the "London 
Economist," a highly respectable publication, says: 
"The scheme is about as sound as the breaking of the 
plate glass in the interest of the glaziers. To spend 
labor and capital in the production of food, and then 
to make a holocaust of the gathered food, is too child- 
ish for real criticism." 

"Childish" is not an adequate word to designate 
such high-handed practices of defying bountiful crops 
and artificially raising the price on the people's favor- 
ite beverage. "Criminal" is a much more appropriate 
word, for the results are self-evident : decreased com- 
fort for the poorer portion of our population and the 
increased tribute payment for those who are, as yet, 
able to pay the high prices. Your grocer is charging 
you from 25 to 60 cents for a pound of coffee, which, 
had the "smart" trick of the coffee trust miscarried, 
would have cost you only 15 cents a pound, or less. 

MONOPOLIZED RAILROADS ALLIES OF 
TRUSTS 

It would be tiresome, indeed, to recount the mis- 
deeds of all the trusts, for their methods are similar. 
We have not inquired into the shady doings of the 
starch trust, the Standard Oil, nor of that thieving 
cheat, the Sugar Trust ; and we shall leave them alone. 
But the picture of spoils and depredations would have 



104 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

been incomplete had we omitted the railroad mag- 
nates, for they are playing a highly important part in 
creating the high cost of living for the American 
people. 

There is scarcely an industry of such vital impor- 
tance as railway public carriers. Railroads are likened, 
with excellent reason, to the arteries of a human body; 
for, with their help, the life blood of the nation is 
carried to all parts, no matter how distant, wherever 
and whenever it is needed. Should the railroads be- 
come out of order, or indulge in "crooked" practices, 
the life of the nation would be immediately crippled. 
As the principal means for communication and trans- 
portation, the railroads are of the utmost import to 
the people. 

The railroad freight and passenger rates are their 
prices. An increase in any of them affects at once 
everything else in our social life. For instance, an 
increase in a freight rate on apples is bound to im- 
mediately raise the market price of apples. Should 
the freight rates become unreasonably high, the prices 
of all commodities would become correspondingly 
high. A monopoly in railroads is the most pernicious 
of all monopolies, and the most far-reaching. 

In this connection the Interstate Commissioner, in 
his annual report, says: ''Competition between our 
carriers by rail, which so far acted as a check or re- 
straint against unreasonable rates, has been to a great 
extent suppressed and destroyed. ... As the result of 
consolidation of all the railroads into a half a dozen 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 105 

groups, the shipper has no longer a choice, but must 
submit to the rates charged, whether reasona ' ^r 
unreasonable." Here again we find the American 
people officially declared at the mercy of the monopo- 
lists ! 

The railroads have ever been the stanchest allies of 
the trusts of all descriptions, especially of the Coal 
Trust. They have always exhibited open favoritism 
and rendered all the help in their power to those who 
were at the head of trusts. Unlawful rebates, special 
discriminating rates, private cars, etc., were ever the 
means to cement the alliance. In addition to this it 
is interesting to note that over 96% of the coal mines 
in America are owned and controlled by the railroads, 
who are "fixing" the prices for the consumer at from 
$6 to $7 per ton, against about $3.50, the cost of min- 
ing and transportation. An annual tribute of from 
one to two hundred million dollars is exacted from 
the American people by this coal-railroad monopoly 
alone ! 

Thus the '^unreasonable" rates which our farmers 
and other common shippers "have to submit to" are 
steadily forcing them out of business, while the Coal- 
Railroad Kings are growing richer and richer, so that 
their wealth is no longer counted by mere millions, 
but by tens of millions. 

Oh, how prosperous we are! 



io6 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 



DRY GOODS TRUST DENOUNCING ITS 
BRETHREN 

In conclusion we shall call to the stand an entirely 
unprejudiced witness, the Wholesale Dry Goods As- 
sociation, a newly organized trust. It comprises in 
the city of New York alone 132 wholesalers and re- 
tailers, and is affiliated with more than twenty-eight 
thousand dry goods merchants throughout the country. 

The chairman of the association, Frederick B. Ship- 
ley, said recently: "The control of the cotton textiles 
of the entire country is in the hands of the manufac- 
turers (Cotton Trust), who are able to 'fix' arbi- 
trarily the prices not only for the wholesalers and re- 
tailers, but even for the importers. It means that the 
American people have to pay at least one-third more 
for their own cotton goods than is paid for them in 
Europe. When I tell you that this country uses an- 
nually cotton goods to the amount of one and one- 
half billion of dollars, you will readily see what this 
excess price means, and that manufacturers are rapidly 
growing rich at the expense of the American people, 
— at the expense of poor men." 

"While the cotton is grown, spun and woven, and 
made up in the United States," continues Mr. Ship- 
ley, "Americans at home are paying 33 1/3% more 
than the purchasers in Europe. Yet, by reason of im- 
proved machinery, we are manufacturing cotton con- 
siderably cheaper than it is possible abroad. . . . The 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 107 

wages Daid over here do not exceed nine per cent, of 
;the entire cost." 

Many thanks, Mr. Shipley. 

Thus, from the mouth of ''one of them" we have re- 
ceived ample corroboration of the conclusions arrived 
at in our inquiry. According to this valuable testi- 
mony, the trusts are guilty of "fixing arbitrary prices"; 
of making us pay at home for our own goods "one- 
third more than is paid in Europe" ; of enriching them- 
selves "at the expense of the American people"; and 
of paying only a pittance to the workmen, being aided 
by improvements in machinery. A powerful arraign- 
ment and delivered with righteous indignation. Com- 
ing from such a source, it is doubly valuable. 

INDUSTRIAL MILLIONAIRISM IS UN- 
DESIRABLE 

We have seen that with the invention of innumer- 
able labor-saving devices, and with the adoption of 
production and distribution on a large scale, the goods 
produced and distributed should naturally be much 
cheaper and most accessible to the "greatest number" 
of persons, spreading real prosperity among the 
American people. 

We have seen that such natural and beneficial ef- 
fects of the progress of civilization are not in evidence 
to-day mainly because some reactionary force has de- 
prived the American people of such benefits, having 
arbitrarily and unnaturally limited production by forc- 
ing down the prices to be paid to the farmer-producer 



io8 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

and raising up the prices to be exacted from the peo- 
ple-consumers, — especially oi.U ^ necessaries of life. 

We have seen that everything points to the trusts 
as the reactionary force in question ; that trusts them- 
selves, as large combinations of capital, are a pro- 
gressive force, and would have been of inestimable 
benefit to the people had they been properly guided. 
They v^ould certainly have been the means of reducing 
the prices for consumers, and not increasing them. 
They w^ould have been real advance guards of civiliza- 
tion if only they were directed to do good, not evil. 

We have also seen that the guiding spirits of trusts, 
the millionaire shareholders and practical owners, are 
guilty of misdirecting the latent energies of trusts for 
good and turning them to evil. These "souls" of trusts 
are prompted almost exclusively by nothing better 
than selfish motives of self-aggrandizement, and seek- 
ing the attainment of their ends, like Machiavelli of 
old, by any means within reach, whether fair or foul. 

Step by step we have arrived at a point where a 
logical conclusion forces itself upon us. 

Whereas a reactionary force retards the progress of 
civilization, depriving the people of its benefits, and 

Whereas, the millionaire shareholders, the owners 
of trusts, are the prime movers of the said reaction- 
ary force. 

Therefore, it is plain that said directors of the reac- 
tionary force are undesirable and should be divested 
of their power for evil. The Special Privilege of 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 109 

Monopoly should be withdrawn from them, for it 
rightfully belongs only to the people as a whole, and 
was conferred upon private individuals most unwisely. 

The history of the last fifty years has clearly demon- 
strated that, as long as individuals are permitted to 
acquire and own unlimited interests in any industry, 
they will eventually own the industries themselves, 
and will run them "to suit themselves," while the 
people will be deprived of any voice in the matter; 
industrial kings will become their "bosses" and the 
people their servants, either as dependent "employees," 
or as humble customers and tribute-payers. 

Millionaire stockholders, trust rulers, monopolists 
and dictators of prices on the necessities of the people ; 
despots who "limit" production and drive the farmer- 
producer out of business by denying him his legiti- 
mate profits; who create an artificial scarcity of food 
for the people that they may tax them the harder; 
who retard the onward progress of civilization, and, 
instead of spreading comfort and ease, spread broad- 
cast misery and destitution; such millionaires are an 
anomaly in human society, and such millionaires' legal 
extinction should "devoutly be wished for"; for such 
millionaires there is no room in a land of free people, 
in a democratic republic; from such millionaires we 
can never be delivered too soon ! 

Can anything but a direct law limiting "private pos- 
sessions" dispose of such millionaires, forever and 
evermore? 



no KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



CHAPTER V 

Unemployment — Question of Life or Death for 
Millions 

UNEMPLOYMENT IS UNKNOWN AMONG 
ANIMALS AND SAVAGES 

The question of unemployment does not exist in the 
animal kingdom. The birds have no difficulty in find- 
ing the seeds and berries necessary for their sus- 
tenance ; the grazing animals find grass in abundance ; 
the bears, plenty of honey ; and the lions, their prey to 
feast upon. There the lack of means for maintaining 
existence, unemployment, is a myth. The personal 
exertions of any animal, as a rule, are speedily re- 
warded by the attainment of the desired results, — 
food and shelter. The animal kingdom has no beg- 
gars or paupers; neither has it grab-it-all monsters. 
These are found only in the human kingdom, where 
they flourish amidst congenial surroundings. 

A savage, in a state of primitive simplicity, leads a 
life of ease and freedom. He indulges in pleasurable 
hunting, warring, and other similar pastimes and rec- 
reations, which are, at the same time, furnishing him 
with the means for existence. His squaw and children 
cook his food, dress the skins of slain animals, make 
garments and moccasins ; while he, during his days of 
leisure, fashions his arms and some tools. Together 
they rear up their unpretentious wigwams for resi- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE iii^ 

dence and business. In short, everyone has some em- 
ployment, suitable for his age and strength. Such a 
primitive life is certainly devoid of many comforts, as 
the limited wealth of savages consists only of scanty 
clothing, arms, half-wild ponies, and a few other in- 
significant articles. No stock of provisions is ever 
laid by for future use, and, therefore, their existence is 
but precarious. Yet, though insecure, and often un- 
comfortable, the condition of man in a state of sav- 
agery does not present marked inequalities. When 
the tribe has a prosperous time, owing to a successful 
hunt or rich spoils from war, everybody shares in the 
good things, and no one suffers for lack of food, shel- 
ter or clothing. During hard times, hardships are 
shared by all. But prosperity on top and poverty be- 
low, luxury for the few and unemployment and mis- 
ery for the many, are unknown among savages. 

CAPITAL AND LABOR— UNNATURAL TWINS 

Flock-tending and agriculture, in the next stage of 
development, are favorable for the accumulation of 
private property in the possession of thrifty individ- 
uals. Although personal exertions are still important, 
the ownership of a shanty and a flock of sheep ad- 
vances the possessor to the position of a capitalist. 
As such, he is at liberty to indulge in a life of com- 
parative ease and leisure, limiting his personal activi- 
ties to the management of his estate and to the super- 
intendence over hired "help," which makes its appear- 
ance simultaneously with the capitalist. 



11^ KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Capital and labor; employer and help; — come into 
existence and begin developing at the same time. 
They are the twins, making their initial bow side by 
side. But, unlike natural twins, their subsequent 
growth is not proportionate. In fact, it presents an 
inverted ratio: while capital grows stronger and fat- 
ter, labor becomes correspondingly weaker and leaner. 

Opportunities for amassing larger accumulations of 
private property increase with the advance of civiliza- 
tion, until to-day one may become a veritable nabob, 
worth many millions of dollars; lead a life of sump- 
tuous luxury heretofore unheard of; boss over and 
profit by the labor of thousands of now helpless 
"help" ; and, withal, be considered a benefactor of man- 
kind, with about as much justice as a bear appropri- 
ating the contents of a beehive may be considered a 
benefactor of bees. 

Bi' o the annoyance of these huge appropriators 
of the people's wealth, a question of ''unemployment" 
appears on the stage, at first uncertainly, but after a 
while assuming proportions which draw the attention 
of everyone. Much to the chagrin of men of wealth, it 
has risen of late to the dignity of a grave national 
problem demanding an immediate and satisfactory so- 
lution. 

The fact is that at the present time, when we have 
apparently reached the highest state of prosperity and 
civilization, hundreds of thousands of our fellow- 
citizens are unable to obtain any work, while mil- 
lions are employed on part-time only, less than six out 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 113: 

of twelve months. The problem is indeed very grave. 
It is a question of life or death for a great many of our 
fellow-men. But the solution is woefully lacking. 

CIVILIZATION BEGETS UNEMPLOYMENT 

Simultaneous development of capitalism and unem- 
ployment is not accidental. It is based upon the na- 
ture of private property. It demonstrates that their 
relation is that of a necessary sequence: one is the 
cause of the other. 

About a hundred years ago the venerable La Fay- 
ette, addressing a large open-air meeting in the city 
of Boston, exclaimed ''Where are your poor? In this 
assembly I see them not. They seem to be found no- 
where in America." 

How thoroughly contented his hearers must have 
been ! Those were glorious times, and the American 
people may be justly proud of that period, feeling now 
a deep regret that it is past and gone. Is it possible 
that there was a time when poverty was not present in 
this land? It seems a chimera, a dream; because we 
are told that poverty is an institution which is to abide 
with us forever, no matter how prosperous we may 
become. Perhaps La Fayette was mistaken? Hardly. 
A hundred years ago the people of the United States 
were indeed prosperous. They could claim and ob- 
tain, for the mere asking, all the land they needed for 
their homesteads. True, the giant industries were yet 
in embryo; but, as a matter of consequence, unem- 



114 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

ployment and poverty did not disgrace this fair land, 
and could not have been possible in the midst of real 
plenty accessible to all. 

At present, with no more land to be had, and with 
all the important industries in the safe-keeping of a 
few persons, the majority of Americans have, the same 
as savages, nothing but their personal services to rely 
on for securing for themselves the necessaries and 
scant comforts of life. Yet, unlike savages, they have 
no free prairies to roam over, no deer to slay ; nothing 
except the doubtful privilege of extending an offer of 
their personal services, in an open industrial market, 
and receive in exchange an average market existence 
wage. And, if their services are, as often happens, 
^^not wanted," they have to face that dread problem of 
unemployment, the disgrace of the twentieth century. 

Thus, at the highest point of civilization, the ma- 
jority of American people, homeless and without any 
property worth mentioning, ARE WORSE OFF 
THAN THE SAVAGES OR EVEN DUMB ANI- 
MALS! 

Is civilization a cruel mockery? It certainly is more 
harmful to the American people than the environment 
of savagery was for the redskins. But, if civilization 
is not to be blamed, then who or what is that evil fac- 
tor which forces it to bear such bitter fruit? 

Unemployment is the effect; what is its cause? 
Common sense revolts from impugning civilization 
itself of being the cause of the evil. Civilization, like 
the principle of a combination involved in the forma- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 115 

tion of trusts, was meant by its nature to be of in- 
estimable benefit to mankind; unfortunately, it was 
also sidetracked, and made a source of evil instead of 
good. 

Let us try to find the culprit. 



PILGRIM FATHERS VANGUARD OF THE 
UNEMPLOYED 

Various theories have been advanced as to the 
causes of unemployment. The most plausible among 
them is the theory of "overcrowding.'* 

Unemployment, as a chronic condition of mankind, 
is quite old. It was in its acute stage as many as 
300 years ago, when the Pilgrim Fathers, the vanguard 
of the army of European unemployed, commenced the 
exodus of that army to the New World. The follow- 
ing reasons for the emigration of some 900 colonists, 
given by their leader, John Winthrop, the first Gov- 
ernor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, are very in- 
structive. They are expressed in the quaint language 
of olden times and are extremely earnest: 'T must 
tell you, my brethren, that our dear mother finds her 
family overcharged, as she has been forced to deny 
harbor to her own children. . . . England has grown 
weary of her inhabitants, so that man, who is the most 
precious of all creatures, is of less value than a horse 
or a sheep. . . . Many of our people have perished 
for want of sustenance and employment; many others 
live miserably and not to the honor of so bountiful a 



Ii6 KINGS OF V^EALTH VS, 

housekeeper as the Lord of Heaven and Earth is. . . . 
Mother-country has fulfilled its earnest desire to rid 
itself of the great bodies of the unemployed peo- 
ple. ..." 

From this valuable testimony we can plainly see 
that the problem of unemployment was in evidence 
many years ago, our forefathers having been made 
victims of this chronic ailment of mankind. For many 
centuries "great bodies of unemployed people" ''live 
miserably" and many "perish for want of sustenance 
and employment." As to the cause of such a wretched 
condition, it is supposed to be, as given by John Win- 
throp, an "overcharging," or, in other words, over- 
crowding. 

The "overcharging" caused "dear mother to con- 
ceive an earnest desire to rid itself of" the Pilgrim 
Fathers. Yet at that time England did not have one- 
tenth of the population it supports to-day. It could 
not have been a natural overcrowding. 

While the real reason is not given, it may easily be 
surmised by taking into consideration the fact that 
the principal part of the wealth of England consisted 
then of land, which was (and is even now) almost 
entirely monopolized: one-half of the kingdom being 
the private property of less than 8,000 persons; the 
peers alone, not 600 in number, own one-fourth of the 
geographical area and one-fifth of the entire wealth 
of the country ! 

Under the circumstances it is not at all surprising 
that many superfluous Englishmen, little relishing the 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 117 

notion of being considered of less value "than a horse 
or a sheep," decided rather to brave the hardships and 
perils of a long sea voyage, and to emigrate to the 
New World. Obviously, the "overcharging" which 
had thus driven them away from their homes was not 
a natural but an artificial phenomenon, similar to that 
which is causing at the present time the high cost of 
living, the artificial "over-production," etc.; all of 
which is brought about by the principle of "unlimited 
ownership," which causes everywhere anomalous con- 
ditions. 

ARTIFICIAL OVERCROWDING CAUSES 
UNEMPLOYMENT 

The theory of natural overcrowding cannot as yet 
be considered as completely exploded. It has been 
too persistently advanced, and, strange to say, ac- 
cepted by many persons who should have known bet- 
ter. Even at the time when the redskinned warrior 
roamed undisturbed over the wide range of the prairies 
of the Far West, and the immense resources of the 
New World were hardly touched, some wise heads in 
Europe announced their grave apprehensions that "the 
means of subsistence cannot increase as fast as the 
people," and that all the distress occasioned by unem- 
ployment, low wages, etc., is due to a too-rapid in- 
crease in numbers of the population of the earth. 
Therefore, the wise men, with Malthus as their head, 
issued the sage and benign advice to the people: "to 



ii8 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

abstain from further multiplying themselves." TKe 
advice was offered in all seriousness. Wonderful to 
record, quite a number of learned political economists 
have accepted this remarkable counsel and even em- 
bodied it into a deeply scientific theory, named in 
honor of its chief exponent, the Malthusian Theory. 
The people, however, refused to take the counsel seri- 
ously and never followed the sage precepts of learned 
theorists. 

At the present time, when the unskilled labor of 
America's sturdy pioneers and their primitive tools 
have been superseded by a steam plow, a reaping ma- 
chine, and other ingenious devices, which have in- 
creased the food-producing capacity of this nation 
many hundreds of times, — not sages alone, but the 
uninitiated as well, may readily see that "the means 
of subsistence" can be increased almost at will. Thus 
the Malthusian Theory is nothing but a huge joke. 
Yet the "overcrowding" theory still clings to us with 
the tenacity of a leech. 

It is estimated that in the present state of advanced 
methods in agriculture the United States can com- 
fortably support a population of a billion human be- 
ings. As regards the supposed "overcrowding," the 
present density of the population in our country con- 
tradicts this theory flatly: our density of population 
is extremely low, barely twenty persons to a square 
mile, as against 500 or more in many places of Europe 
and Asia. 

Yet, in spite of all, we are deemed to be already 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 119 

"overcrowded." Acting under the stress of such ap- 
prehension, our government is already forcibly ex- 
cluding all emigrants who have not in their possession 
some cash (presumably a sign of emigrant prosper- 
ity). It is done mainly out of fear of admitting new 
competitors for our supposedly "overcrowded" unem- 
ployed and part-employed. 

Thus the insignificant density of population and the 
wonderful progress in improved methods of producing 
food are proofs that we are very far from being over- 
crowded; the multitude of the unemployed and the 
exclusion of emigrants indicate that we are. Only 
one conclusion can be drawn from such a contradic- 
tion : WE ARE NOT NATURALLY OVER- 
CROWDED; ARTIFICIALLY WE ARE. 

The powerful force that causes this artificial over- 
crowding is exactly the same that clogs the wheels of 
civilization as applied to the principle of industrial 
combination; that diverts the benefits of labor-saving 
devices from their natural course; and that maims the 
American people without mercy. 

There is a saying: "All roads lead to Rome." In 
this case the various investigations of any and all 
economic iniquities of the present day lead invariably 
to the same central source of evil, — the inequitable dis- 
tribution of wealth caused by the unlimited ownership 
of a few Kings of Wealth. 



120 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



DOES MACHINERY CREATE UNEMPLOY- 
MENT? 

The tendency to forsake country life, exchanging it 
for a life in really overcrowded cities, is decried by 
many. But it seems to be an inevitable course. Dr. 
A. C. True, of the Department of Agriculture, stated 
some time ago that within the last twenty years "over 
two million men gave up farming to join the great 
army of toilers in the cities, because they were not 
needed on the farms any longer. With the help of 
improved machinery a small number of men can turn 
out a greater product to-day than a larger number of 
laborers could possibly secure in olden times." 

This is a "poser" for those benevolent persons whose 
favorite advice to the city unemployed is "Go into the 
country." But they are not needed there, says the 
expert; and he proves it by irrefutable argument of 
the effect of improved labor-saving devices. 

The immediate result of the introduction of labor- 
saving machinery is that a great many workers are 
deprived of their customary occupations. Although it 
is true that new industries are created and give em- 
ployment to many of those who were deprived of it, 
yet it appears indisputable that labor-saving machinery 
is bound to save the labor and make the laborer use- 
less for the time being. It saves the labor for the 
employer, and thereby it deprives of employment all 
those whose labor it has helped to save. A few ex- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 121 

amples will illustrate the correctness of this assertion. 

In a modern tannery, for instance, one can see a 
"putting out" machine, an ingenious contrivance 
which presses and scrapes the tanned hides at the rate 
of 350 dozens a day. It is attended by one man! 

According to M. G. Mulhall, one American "hand," 
with mechanical aid, produces as much grain as five 
European woricers. Also only four "hands" are needed 
for the production of grain sufficient to supply with 
flour one thousand persons for one year. 

Edward Atkinson states that the annual labor of 
only seven men i3 required for the production, trans- 
portation, baking and distribution of one thousand bar- 
rels of flour in the shape of bread sufficient for the 
nourishment of one thousand persons for a whole 
year. (The shade of Malthus must feel very uncom- 
fortable at hearing this.) That one operator in a cot- 
ton factory makes cloth sufficient for 250 persons; 
that in a woolen factory one workman produces enough 
goods to clothe 300 persons; in a boot and shoe fac- 
tory, enough to furnish one thousand men and women 
with footwear to last a whole year. 

The annual labor of only fifteen men is sufficient to 
supply one thousand persons with all the food, cloth- 
ing and footwear they may require. Obviously, 985 
men out of each 1,000 will find it impossible to get a 
"job" in the mentioned industries. "They are not 
needed there." 

In the mining industry each and every pneumatic 
drill has replaced and thrown out of work one dozen 



122 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

workmen. Twenty-five years ago two men were re- 
quired for operating an oil well; to-day sixty wells 
are operated simultaneously with the help of a surface 
rod, a pumping-jack and a gas engine, all of them 
manipulated by only six men. One hundred and four- 
teen workers were permanently deprived of their work. 

In the printing industry one modern newspaper 
press operated by five men only turns out printed mat- 
ter which would have required the combined labor of 
2,500 printers on the old-fashioned Franklin press; 
2,495 workers were thrown out of a job. 

In box-making a little girl tending a box-making 
machine turns out 12,000 berry baskets a day! All 
grown-up male workers have evidently been relegated 
into the ranks of the unemployed. 

On the average a private factory owner in America 
has at his command a power machinery of about 70 
h. p., which produces as much as the labor of 700 men 
would have produced. Who can gainsay that it ''does 
save the labor," or rather the hire of labor, to each 
and every one of the owners of factories. Deducting 
a comparatively small outlay for hiring men, women 
and children (preferably children, on account of cheap- 
ness), for the operating and maintenance of that ma- 
chinery, — the entire product of these 700 dumb labor- 
ers goes to the owner as his "labor-saver" and net 
"profit." Meanwhile, what are the displaced 690 "liv- 
ing" laborers to do for their living? 

With the continuous and rapid advance of civiliza- 
tion the introduction of new and still more effective 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 123 

labor-saving devices is bound to throw out of em- 
ployment thousands upon thousands of workmen, aug- 
menting the ranks of the unemployed to appalling pro- 
portions. 

INVENTIONS DO NOT BENEFIT MAJORITY 
OF THE PEOPLE 

Does the wonderful progress in invention of new 
and improved machinery cause unemployment in 
America? As it is computed that one man does to- 
day, in effectiveness, the work of fifty men of half a 
century ago, the natural question arises, what shall 
the remaining forty-nine men do to earn their living? 
Even though new industries have since sprung into 
existence, giving employment to many, thousands are 
still unemployed; and with new inventions and im- 
provements in labor-saving machinery many more 
thousands are bound to be thrown out of employment. 

The facts prove that, instead of benefiting, the 
labor-saving machinery has wrought mischief in the 
world of labor. Surely the presence in our midst of 
a permanent and ever-increasing host of the unem- 
ployed clearly indicates that t!.a inventions of labor- 
saving machinery do not benefit the majority of our 
population. On the contrary, they drive many thou- 
sands of workmen into the desperate condition of "per- 
ishing for want of sustenance and employment" and 
of leading a life of poverty and misery "not to the 
honor of so bountiful a housekeeper as the Lord of 
Heaven and Earth is" ! 



124 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

Yet, under ordinary conditions, the high state of 
technical knowledge and the resulting innumerable 
labor-saving devices should undoubtedly spread ease 
and comfort among the people, reducing want to a 
minimum ; should give the people leisure to enjoy 
life by shortening the hours of toil ; should enable all 
to freely and fully exercise their inalienable right to 
"life, liberty and pursuit of happiness." Why don't 
they do it? We shall see. 

MACHINES BENEFIT THEIR OWNERS 

A hard-working man was Robinson Crusoe prior to 
finding his labor-saving machine in the person of a 
submissive savage. "And first I let him know his 
name should be Friday," says Robinson in his diary. 
"I likewise taught him to call me 'master.' . . . Never 
man had a more faithful, loving servant than my man 
Friday was to me. ... I was greatly delighted with 
him, and made it my business to teach him everything 
that was proper to make him useful, handy and help- 
ful. ... I set him to work to beating corn out and 
sifting it in the manner I used to do, and in a little 
time my man Friday was able to do all the work for 
me. ... I began really to love the creature . . . and 
now my life was so easy that I cared not if I was 
never to remove from my island." 

This labor-saving machine had evidently saved, for 
its owner, "all the work" and made him perfectly 
comfortable and contented, and his life "so easy." 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 125 

Anyon-^ who dwells in a well-furnished house, sup- 
plied with the latest improvements, is leading a life 
of comparative ease and comfort. He hardly requires 
the presence of a ''living help" ; he has numerous "in- 
animate" helpers in dumbwaiters, sewing machine, 
washing machine, appliances for cooking by gas or 
electricity, lighting, heating, telephones, hot and cold 
water, etc. All these real labor-saving devices are 
actually saving labor for their possessor, and they 
greatly alleviate for him the drudgery of housekeep- 
ing. But, in order to be benefited by them, one must 
either own them outright or at least be in a position 
to afford paying a consideration for their use. 

The former hardships of toil and long hours of the 
American farmer have been almost entirely relieved 
by the invention of such marvels as a steam plow, a 
reaping machine, a thresher and harvester, and many 
other ingenious devices in the line of agricultural pur- 
suit. But these machines are expensive, and only com- 
paratively few can afford to purchase and own them. 
Again, machinery is benefiting its owner or him who 
can afford to pay for its use. 

The same applies to any branch of industry. The 
following tradition exists in reference to the inven- 
tion of one of the first important improvements in the 
effectiveness of a steam engine, — a connecting belt. 
It is said that the invention was made and for the first 
time successfully applied by a small boy who, tired of 
turning by hand for many hours a day the wheel of a 
secondary machine, as was his duty to do, cleverly 



126 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

connected his wheel by a piece of leather strop witH 
the large fly wheel of a near-by steam engine, and 
made the latter do his work. The results of this clever 
invention were : The owner of the factory was greatly 
benefited by the invention, and the boy — lost his job ! 
His services were, of course, "no longer required." 

Thus the "well-to-do" owners of houses with "mod- 
ern improvements," the owners of well-equipped farms 
and factories, are enjoying the benefits and profits 
from labor-saving inventions, while the propertyless 
laborer is only forced by them into the ranks of the 
twentieth century "miserables," — the unemployed. 

The very elements of nature, — water, steam, elec- 
tricity, and the air itself, — have been pressed into ser- 
vice to toil incessantly for their owners. Yes, "own- 
ers" is a proper word to apply in this connection. Be- 
cause water is of small commercial value unless an 
elaborate plant is owned, transforming it into a water- 
power; steam is useless if not utilized by complicated 
and expensive machinery; and electricity is only a 
source of danger unless subdued, concentrated and 
rendered highly efifective by expensive plants, each of 
which costs a small fortune. Hundreds of thousands 
of dollars are often required for the equipment of one 
of these devices designed for the capture and subju- 
gation of nature's elements. Once harnessed, however, 
they respond nobly by performing wonders, benefiting 
indirectly the people at large, but directly, and too 
often exclusively, their owners. 

The said "owners" are, as a rule, multimillionaires 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 127 

who cannot help becoming all-powerful monopolists. 
Yet if but for such wholesale monopolization of most 
of the labor-saving machines, — and even elements of 
nature, — the American people would have been really 
prosperous and the army of the unemployed would 
certainly be heard of no longer in the domain of ''so 
bountiful a housekeeper as the Lord of Heaven and 
Earth is." 



MONOPOLIZED MACHINERY IS HARMING 
THE PEOPLE 

While a comparatively insignificant portion of the 
population of this country owns, possesses and derives 
direct benefits and pecuniary profits from labor-saving 
machinery, the great majority of the American people, 
being wholly deprived of any participation in the 
profits from industries, and having nothing but their 
personal services to rely on for the gaining of their 
livelihood, — are driven, owing to the introduction of 
new and still more expensive machinery, into the dis- 
mal stages of semi-employment, unemployment and 
utter destitution. 

Indeed, if one thousand persons are supplied with 
necessary footwear by the labor of one cobbler in a 
shoe factory, and with clothing and food by the labor 
of only fourteen workmen, then it is self-evident that 
a great many cobblers, operatives and food producers 
are of necessity finding that "their services are not 
required." 



128 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

It is also evident that, with still greater improve- 
ments in machinery, a smaller and smaller numbe^ of 
laborers will be required. How can then the unem- 
ployed earn their living? And, if they are not able 
to earn it by their "labor," then what is to become of 
them? Are they superfluous on this planet? It is a 
frightful condition; a condition savoring of the dark 
ages, of barbarism. Millions of human beings, owing 
to the monopolization of labor-saving machinery by a 
few "specially privileged," are artificially "over- 
crowded." 

It is plain, of course, that civilization and progress 
have nothing to do with this "artificial overcrowding." 
The labor-saving machines, being instrumental in pro- 
ducing great wealth, are meant to be a blessing to 
mankind. But they are turned into a scourge by a 
hoggish monopolization of them by the few and the 
complete exclusion of the many. 

UNEMPLOYMENT MUST INCREASE 
ENORMOUSLY 

There is hardly any room for doubt that in America, 
as well as anywhere else where monopoly is on the 
increase, the number of the unemployed must also 
proportionately increase, until a stage is reached which 
is so frightfully illustrated in the examples of China 
and the East Indies. 

When machinery is so improved that the entire 
work in a factory will consist of the turning of a 



(THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 129 

handle of some giant machine, a little girl is likely to 
be hired to do the turning for about $3 a week. The 
"owner" will then pocket all the immense profits from 
this universal labor-saving machine, and the rest of 
the people will be thrown out of employment for good, 
their services will be obviously "not wanted." 

The case is extreme, but it serves the purpose of 
an illustration. The tendency of improvements in ma- 
chinery is to require fewer and fewer workmen to do 
the work; otherwise their appellation, "labor-saving," 
is a misnomer. 

It also forcibly demonstrates the fearful prospect in 
store for millions of Americans unless we clearly real- 
ize the INADEQUACY OF THE SYSTEM OF 
WAGE-WORKING. Wages alone are evidently in- 
sufficient. THE PEOPLE MUST HAVE A SHARE 
IN THE PROFITS DERIVED FROM THE USE 
OF THE LABOR-SAVING MACHINERY, for, as 
indicated above, a time may come when the only re- 
maining wage-worker will be that little girl at $3 per 
week ! 

From the foregoing there is but one strictly logical 
conclusion: Unlimited ownership by private individ- 
uals of great labor-saving devices and machines is a 
gross injustice to the people and is, therefore, rightly 
resented by them. Monopolization of the labor-saving 
machinery being harmful, they must be reclaimed by 
the people, and owned by the people and for the 
people. But government ownership, advocated by the 
Socialists, is not the only way to achieve the desired 



130 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

result. It may, perhaps, become a fact at some dis- 
tant day. Meanwhile, the proposed law of limited 
ownership is a practical step in the right direction. 
It is bound to bring the ownership, and the consequent 
profit-taking, derived from the labor-saving machines 
to very large groups of men, such groups as the mu- 
tual insurance companies, building and loan associa- 
tions, etc., consist of at the present time. In such 
mutual companies millions of persons, — as will be 
shown in the next chapter, — have been using to mu- 
tual advantage the labor-saving devices for a great 
many years, and have been deriving from them mu- 
tually all the benefits and all the profits. 

Shall we continue looking languidly and indolently 
at the rapid growth of private monopoly and at the 
constantly increasing misery of the countless semi- 
employed, unemployed, and even starving Americans, 
while the Socialists are also dreaming a dream or are 
advocating confiscation, a revolution, etc. ; or shall we 
enact a practical Law of Limited Ownership that is 
destined to harm no one and benefit everyone? Which 
shall it be? 

But perhaps there is some other remedy for this 
dangerous condition of unemployment? Let us take 
a parting glance at what the wise men of different 
nations have had to say upon the subject, and what 
lessons have been given us in this respect by the his- 
tory of mankind. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 131 



ROCKEFELLER'S REMEDY FOR UNEM- 
PLOYMENT 

"A laborer is worthy of his hire; no less and no 
more," says John D. Rockefeller. "He must in the 
long run contribute an equivalent for what he is paid. 
If he does not do this he is probably pauperized and 
you at once throw out the balance of things/' 

What sublime philosophy! Coming from such a 
source, this serenely calm and eminently cold-blooded 
exposition of the dread problem of unemployment is 
very interesting and highly instructive. The vener- 
able Father of Trusts evidently takes for granted that 
the laborer who finds himself in the ranks of the un- 
employed is merely unworthy of his hire, owing to his 
laziness, presumably, to bad habits, morals, etc., or, 
perhaps, because he is stupid, unruly or in some other 
way unfit for the performance of the duties stipulated 
in that hire. Such may be the case in a few excep- 
tional instances. As a rule, however, the implied low 
standard of morality and intelligence cannot possibly 
be applied to millions of unemployed or partly em- 
ployed Americans. 

With due respect to Mr. Rockefeller, we are com- 
pelled to reject his offhand theory and solution of the 
vexatious problem of unemployment. It is too shal- 
low; the cause lies much deeper. It has been con- 
clusively proven by official statistics that good or bad 
habits, fitness or unfitness of American workmen, have 



132 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

nothing to do with their inability to get employment. 
THERE IS NO EMPLOYMENT TO BE HAD, no 
matter how "worthy of their hire" the American work- 
ers may be. 

NAPOLEONIC SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM 
OF UNEMPLOYMENT 

History demonstrates that in France, before the 
Revolution, the best land was monopolized by the 
clergy and nobility, who successfully appropriated, as 
their "private" property, about three-fifths of their 
country. The property of the clergy alone was esti- 
mated at a billion of dollars, — immense wealth for 
those times. The King of France and his satellites, 
the nobles, had the remainder of the good things, 
while twenty-eight million of French people had to 
be contented with what was left for them, — the poorest 
land, and mighty little of that. Both clergy and 
nobility were (mark this!) exempt from taxation! 
They did not even have to "swear off" their taxes, as 
does the American "nobility." 

Under such monstrous distributions of wealth 
(which, by the bye, markedly resembles our own) 
there naturally were countless hosts of the "unem- 
ployed." When the people could stand it no longer 
they rose and put to the sword both the king and the 
nobility. But the question of filling the stomachs of 
the now free yet hungry citizens became the grave 
problem of the hour. It soon reached such an acute 



,THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 133 

stage tha£ all the leaders and officials of the newly 
born Republic lost their heads, both metaphorically 
and literally. Then the situation became so unbear- 
able that the time was ripe for the genius of Napoleon 
to come to the rescue. He speedily organized the 
hungry citizens into invincible armies, and marched 
them off to conquer their neighbors, and, incidentally, 
to fill their stomachs at their neighbors' expense. In 
the common parlance of Wall Street, "he opened for- 
eign markets" for his fellow-citizens. 

The Napoleonic solution of the question of unem- 
ployment worked like a charm. When he was through 
with his conquests hundreds of thousands of the for- 
merly unemployed found lasting "employment" by 
leaving this world forever. Mr. Rockefeller's calm 
remedy had thus a practical application: they were 
"thrown out as the balance of things." 

DEMAND FOR BREAD AND GAMES BY 
ROMAN UNEMPLOYED 

Looking further back into the history of mankind, 
we find that in 100 B.C. the enormous concentration 
of wealth in the possession of a few, and especially 
the immense landed estates of the Roman nobility, 
had impoverished the great Roman Empire to such 
an extent that, out of a population of one million and 
a half, only two thousand citizens held any property, 
while the remainder became the "unemployed" of the 
period. The same cause produces the same result 
everywhere and at all times. 



134 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

Unlike the American unemployed, who humbly pe- 
tition for an opportunity to work, their Roman pre- 
decessors were quite arrogant, auu imperiously de- 
manded "Bread and Games." They were so menacing 
that the inimitable Nero and other "masters" of the 
tottering empire were compelled to furnish "artificial 
employment" for many thousands by causing to be 
erected (at public expense) various fine buildings, via- 
ducts, etc., and in addition thereto they had to feed 
multitudes by a free distribution of corn bread, and 
to entertain them, for several weeks at a time, in 
immense amphitheaters (one of them, the Colliseum, 
had a sitting capacity of 100,000) with gladiatorial 
fights, massacres of Christians, and other equally re- 
fined pastimes. 

In spite of such endeavors the Roman unemployed 
naturally grew more and more numerous, until the 
sturdy barbarians from the north easily conquered 
the impoverished weaklings and put most of them to 
the sword. Thus again a drastic measure was applied 
for the speedy solution of the ever-recurring problem 
of unemployment, and it was in strict keeping with 
the recommendations and practice of both Mr. Rocke- 
feller and the great Napoleon! 

EGYPTIAN PYRAMID BUILDERS 

Should we penetrate into antiquity as far back as 
4000 B.C., to the time when the Egyptian Pharaohs 
held, by virtue of the right divine, the whole Egyptian 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 135 

land as their own "private property" and were bestow- 
ing large slices thereof upon their props, the priests 
and the warriors, while the "common" people held 
their land on leases only, — even then the everlasting 
problem of unemployment was in evidence as plainly 
as it is observed to-day on Cherry Hill, New York, 
or Whitechapel, London, or in any other of its mod- 
ern strongholds. 

The wonderful pyramids are grand monuments to 
the Egyptian method of solving the question of unem- 
ployment. Hundreds of thousands of troublesome and 
idle human beings, including the kinsmen of Joseph, 
son of Jacob, were kept from mischief for a great 
many years by being forced to rear up, under the 
pitiless lash of the overseers, the stupendous edifices 
designed for the final reception of a mummy of their 
"owner" and ruler. True, the wretched pyramid build- 
ers, unlike the modern "beggars for work," were out- 
right slaves and were chastised with a lash. Yet, on 
the other hand, they were housed, clothed and fed 
at the public expense — a consideration not shown to 
the modern unemployed, unless when admitted to a 
poorhouse or jail! 

SUMMARY OF THE CAUSES AND REMEDY 

Summarizing we find that the condition of unem- 
ployment is nonexistent among animals and savages; 
that it appears on the scene simultaneously with the 
birth of "capitalism," when Employer and Help, as 



136 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

unnatural twins, make their initial bow, and then grow 
in an inverted ratio: the fatter the employer, the 
leaner the help. 

We have observed that overcrowding cannot be the 
cause of unemployment in a country with scarcely 
twenty persons to a square mile; that the Malthusian 
theory is a huge joke, whereas the United States alone 
can support more than a billion people; that the his- 
tory of mankind shows the presence of unemployment 
and poverty of the majority of the population when- 
ever and wherever the wealth of a nation became con- 
centrated, and consequently monopolized, in the pos- 
session of a few persons ; that such a condition ex- 
isted, particularly in England, at the time when the 
Pilgrim Fathers emigrated to the New World, and in 
France just prior to the Revolution ; in Rome, pre- 
ceding its fall; and in Egypt during the pyramid- 
building period, in 4000 B.C. 

We have found that labor-saving devices and ma- 
chinery, designed to be of inestimable value and bene- 
fit to mankind, having been monopolized by a few, are 
reaping for their "owners" immense profits, at the 
same time driving the impecunious workers out of 
employment, at first temporarily and then perma- 
nently; that these valuable labor-saving devices, al- 
though constituting the most important part of the 
national wealth, became undoubtedly the absolute 
^'private property" of a very few persons. 

We have seen that about a hundred years ago, upon 
the testimony of La Fayette, our country was con- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 137 

spicuous by the total absence of the unemployed poor; 
and we know, from sad experience, that it is teeming 
to-day with many signs of indigence; that it perma- 
nently contains a standing army of over fifty thousand 
tramps and a million or more of unemployed ; and we 
have seen that a large army of the unemployed was 
always formed at a time when the wealth of a nation 
had become monopolized, as the "private property" of 
the few, be it in Egypt, Rome, France or America. 

We found that the vexing question of unemploy- 
ment, in spite of Mr. Rockefeller's assertion, is not 
caused by unfitness or the low morality of workers; 
and especially such causes cannot be applied in the 
United States, where the partly employed and totally 
unemployed workers cannot be accused of possessing 
such disqualifications. 

We found that the same cause produced the same 
results, whether in a Divine Right country, in 4000 
B.C., or in a Vested Right country, in 1913 A.D. And, 
as for the Remedy, we had to reject Mr. Rockefeller's 
calm recommendation of simply "throwing out as the 
balance of things" all the unemployed, as well as the 
drastic measures of Napoleon and the northern bar- 
barians of putting to the sword the "miserables" of 
the world. What is the remedy, then? 

Obviously, the Remedy must remove the cause, — 
the abnormal concentration and monopolization of the 
national wealth. The Law of Limited Ownership is 
designed to do this, and therefore it is the only effec- 
tive remedy for the mortal disease of unemployment. 



138 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. , 

CHAPTER VI 

Nature's Universal Law of Limitation 

Looking around us, we can easily discern the mani- 
festations of an important law of nature which may- 
be called the Law of Limitation. The Maker of this 
planet decreed, with inscrutable wisdom and fore- 
sight, that there should be a limit to all things, ma- 
terial and spiritual. The earth, though abounding in 
an infinite variety of objects, contains nothing that is 
unlimited. Everything has its limit, either in extent 
or capacity. There are high, snow-capped mountains 
and deep, precipice-like canyons; mighty rivers and 
little brooks; majestic cedars and modest violets; fero- 
cious lions and meek lambs. But we would search in 
vain for anything that is unlimited: Ogres, Cyclops 
and other monsters exist in fairy tales only. Light 
has its limit in darkness, and day in night; life in 
death and death in resurrection, which is new life. 
Limitations are everywhere, on every side. Among 
men some are seven feet in height, others barely five ; 
no one is known to reach the height of a mile. Some 
weigh three hundred pounds; others one hundred; no 
one weighs a ton. Some have large heads, others 
small; no one has a head as large as a mountain or 
as small as a pin head. In the same way our capaci- 
ties and defects, virtues and vices, talents and short- 
comings are strictly limited by the same universal 
law. In short, everything invariably submits to the 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 139 

mandates of this immutable law of nature, and '^ 
governed correspondingly through its whole period of 
existence. 



HARMONY OF THE WHOLE IS ULTIMATE 
AIM OF EVERYTHING 

As regards the reason why there should be a limit 
to everything, and as to the means for determining 
the desirable extent of such a limit, — these questions 
can be answered best by a deduction from the facts 
under observation. First, in extent and capacity, 
everything is limited to its highest state of efficiency 
and usefulness, and second, — the parts are subservient 
to the whole, with the ultimate aim in view, the har- 
mony of the whole. 

Taking, for instance, the seasons of the year, we 
observe that in the morning of life the buds begin to 
develop, the balmy air and sunshine of spring are 
doing their utmost to aid the budding life in its 
struggle for existence. The sun rays are not then 
so strong as to endanger the best possible development 
of the new life. In summer, however, when adoles- 
cent youth merges into maturity, the sun sends his 
rays with the greatest vigor. Then, life having ma- 
tured, mild and mellow autumn appears on the scene. 
It renders, in its turn, valuable help to the utmost 
efficiency and usefulness of all things. With its 
oblique and soft sunshine it assists nature in garner- 
ing its harvest, in making provision for the future and 



(140 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

in laying the foundation for the regeneration of life. 
Finally the labors of nature terminate, for the time 
being, and it stands in need of complete rest. Then 
the night of life, winter, puts an efficient stop to the 
sources of life: activities of various faculties cease 
and are enveloped in restful slumber. The next spring 
awakens them to new life. 

The harmony of the whole is always the aim of the 
activities of all parts. There can never be any per- 
manent discord in nature. Earthquakes, tornadoes, 
etc., may temporarily disarrange harmony, but it is 
speedily restored by the recuperative powers of na- 
ture, and life goes on smoothly, all things doing their 
best, and not transgressing beyond the limits of their 
greatest usefulness. A unit is always conforming it- 
self to the needs of the total ; the parts to the whole ; 
and the Hmitations imposed upon them are such as 
to produce that exquisite harmony of the whole which 
is observed everywhere in nature to the everlasting 
glory of the Creator. 

LAW OF LIMITATION EXEMPLIFIED IN 
HUMAN BODY 

The human body presents an excellent example 
illustrating the wonderful workings of the law of 
limitation. Every part of the human body, no matter 
how small and apparently unimportant, receives from 
the common fund an amount of nourishment exactly 
sufficient for the proper performance of its duties, for 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 141 

its perfect well-being; neither more nor less. In this 
manner the humblest organ of the body receives com- 
fortable living wages, — so to speak, — on which it is 
enabled to do its very best and thrive. Such wages, 
in life blood, are ceaselessly produced by those inde- 
fatigable workers, the organs of digestion, and con- 
tinually distributed by the no less faithful workers, the 
heart and the lungs, with the assistance of innumer- 
able arteries and veins. The latter, by means of a 
marvelous network of capillaries, are incessantly send- 
ing the precious life-giving fluid to the remotest parts 
of the body, in response to the demand for the same 
created by the work of said parts. 

The activities of various organs of the body are 
regulated, partly consciously, partly automatically, by 
the lofty intellect, emanating from the brain. Thus 
the whole remarkable system receives its commands 
from and is under the supreme guidance of the human 
brain, which, ably assisted by local nerve centers and 
the whole nervous system, is truly the Chief Execu- 
tive of the Law of Limitation in this instance. 

By the direction of the brain the precepts of that 
law are minutely carried out. Nothing oversteps the 
prescribed limits necessary for the attainment of the 
highest efficiency and usefulness; the life blood is 
equitably distributed to all parts; and the welfare of 
the whole, — of the parts as well as of the body, — is 
always maintained. As a result, the wealth of the 
body, consisting mainly of its blood, is mutually 
owned, so to speak, on a limited shareholding plan, 



142 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

and distributed so equitably that no one part receives 
"too much," no one "too little," and all have "enough." 

Such is the condition of the human body, while in 
perfect health. The precepts of the Law of Limita- 
tion are strictly obeyed : harmony is the aim and dis- 
cord is the penalty for infraction of this law. 

Man can do no better than bow with humility, and 
be edified by the perfect workings of this supreme law 
of nature. By carefully noting its ways he should en- 
deavor to intelligently apply them to his own imper- 
fect creation, — the artificial body of men called "so- 
ciety." 

LIMITED OWNERSHIP PRESERVED IN A 
FAMILY 

Turning our attention to the construction and opera- 
tions of society, we find that in any well-balanced fam- 
ily nature's law of limitation is instinctively enforced, 
and therefore perfect harmony is in evidence. The 
worldly possessions belong mutually to all, as well as 
to individuals, and are used, first, for the benefit of 
all, and then for the benefit of each and every member 
in proportion to his needs. No member, however 
clever, is allowed to appropriate an unlimited share 
of the common wealth; for it is clearly realized that 
such an appropriation would militate against the wel- 
fare of all. The selfish greed of individuals is not 
only frowned upon, but effectually curbed, as it should 
be. Consequently the equitable distribution of wealth, 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 143 

that will o' the wisp of mankind, is in operation in the 
domain of a family : no one having too much, all hav- 
ing enough. 

It should also be noted that all members of a fam- 
ily are enjoying equal opportunities, — another seem- 
ingly unattainable desideratum of mankind. The for- 
cible encroachments of the stronger upon the rights 
of the weaker are guarded against ; the material well- 
being of all is looked after; and the intellectual and 
moral development of each member is taken care of. 
All are given an equal opportunity requisite for their 
enlightenment and refinement; they can blame no one 
but themselves should they fail to profit by the oppor- 
tunities offered them. 

Thus the average American family presents all the 
elements which make life worth living. An equitable 
distribution of wealth ; equal rights to all, special privi- 
leges to none; and equality of opportunity are all no 
mere catch words, but real and substantial facts. A 
family is the embryo of a true democratic republic. 
It certainly contains all the requisites for the perfect 
welfare of its members. In good times every member 
shares in the mutual prosperity; in adversity, all feel 
the strain. Owing to a full application of the prin- 
ciple of limited ownership, it is impossible for a fam- 
ily to present the dismal picture of two or three of 
its members rolling in wealth, while the rest are ever- 
lastingly struggling with poverty. 

Oh, what a pity that, as soon as an individual leaves 
the environment of his family and launches on the 



(144 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

troubled sea of society, he finds himself surrounded by 
inimical and treacherous forces, which he must com- 
bat, lest he be overwhelmed and sink to the bottom 
a mauigled wreck! 

BENEFICIAL HOMESTEAD ACT 

At one stage of their history the American people 
appeared as though they were one large family. It 
was at the time when they were confronted with the 
grave land-ownership problem. They solved it to the 
satisfaction of all. 

Having come into the possession of this broad land, 
they adopted a wise and just policy, expressed in the 
Homestead Act, by which they made evident their 
preference for the advisability and justice of parceling 
their common property in land in accordance with the 
only true ideal of a democratic republic, — the principle 
of limited individual ownership. 

They did not allow the fleetest and the strongest to 
rush and take forcible possession of all the available 
land. They strictly forbade that kind of licentious 
proceeding. Instead, they permitted the bonafide set- 
tler to become the actual tiller of the soil and to select, 
cultivate, and eventually own a homestead built upon 
a small but sufficient number of acres of public land. 

Beneficial results of this broad-minded and judi- 
cious legislation are manifest to this day. The coun- 
try presents a robust republic honeycombed with mil- 
lions of homesteads of small farm owners, who are. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 145 

in fact, limited shareholders of the national landed 
wealth. The prosperity and thrift based upon so solid 
a foundation are such that even at the present time, 
notwithstanding the vigorous efforts of powerful mo- 
nopolists to deprive them of their legitimate profits, 
American farmers are, as yet, the backbone of the 
nation, its firmest stronghold ! 

INDUSTRIAL POLICY OF GO-AS-YOU-PLEASE 

It is unfortunate that when our industries began 
to grow apace with the prosperity of the people, and 
then far ahead of it ; when coal, oil, copper, steel, and 
other valuable products of our soil were discovered; 
when the land began to be covered with a network of 
those social arteries, railways; and when numerous 
factories opened their activities — our statesmen and 
legislators did not rise to the occasion, but remained 
merely passive onlookers. An industrial policy of go- 
as-you-please was silently promulgated. They allowed 
the industrial wealth of the country, — unlike its landed 
wealth, — to flow and settle into any private channels 
it might chance to encounter. 

Owing to this short-sighted and injudicious policy 
of "non-interference," the strongest and the quickest, 
and the least scrupulous, rushed to the front, — this 
time unimpeded, — and took firm possession of all the 
industries in sight. Meanwhile a multitude of would- 
be industrial homesteaders was left behind unprovided 
and forsaken. Thus all the oil of this nation speedily 
became the private property of one puissant family ; all 



146 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

the beef of another; all the sugar of a third; and so on 
to the end of the industrial line. 

It was quite natural for the industrial squatters to 
avail themselves of the special privilege granted to 
them, and appropriate, for their own exclusive benefit 
and profit, everything worth appropriation. 

It is almost inconceivable how the American people 
and their statesmen and legislators could display such 
simplicity of mind as not to understand that there is 
no substantial difference between the landed posses- 
sions of a people and their industrial wealth. True, 
the first consists of an immovable and easily measur- 
able land itself. But the second is nothing else but 
the produce of that land. And certainly both are the 
indisputable property of the people, and should be 
used in strict conformity with the mandate of the 
principle, "The greatest good for the greatest num- 
ber." 

As the American people did not choose to give away 
to a few persons their whole landed property, then 
the question arises — was there any sound reason why 
they should have tendered to a few monopolists, as a 
free gift, their entire industrial wealth? 

As it was deemed just and advisable to let every 
citizen have a chance in sharing the national landed 
wealth, why is such a sharing in the nation's indus- 
trial wealth denied to the majority of the American 
people? 

Surely such a policy is unjust and harmful in the 
extreme ! 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 147 



LIMITED BUSINESS OWNERSHIP— INDUS- 
TRIAL HOMESTEAD ACT 

Let us imagine that we were not enveloped in eco- 
nomic slumber at the time when the development of 
our great industries began taking place, and when 
the promoters of various large corporations and un- 
dertakings had applied to us for permission to organ- 
ize for business and to issue their stocks, bonds, etc. 
Let us suppose that, instead of having passively al- 
lowed them the privilege to do and take anything they 
pleased, we had given them only a qualified permit, 
as follows: ''The American people grant you the 
privilege to organize, appropriate, develop and profit 
by your particular industry, upon condition that no 
one is allowed to hold shares in excess of $250,000." 

Had a law to this effect been at that time placed on 
our statute books, the Homestead Act of Industries 
would have been enacted. 

The strongest and the greediest would not have free 
play; the weaker and less talented would have been 
protected and given an opportunity; the number of 
small shareholders would have by this time reached 
into hundreds of thousands, or even millions; a mil- 
lionaire shareholder, — the soul of private monopoly, — 
would have become extinct; consequently, our great 
national industries would not have been (as they un- 
fortunately are) the personal property of a few indus- 
trial magnates; but would have become the property 



148 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

and pride of millions of small shareholders, of the 
people, just as our land is the property and pride of 
millions of small homesteaders. 

These conclusions are arrived at by tracing the ef- 
fect to its cause. As certainly as unlimited private 
ownership does to-day, and ever will, degenerate into 
private monopoly, — limited shareholding does to-day 
(as we shall show later) and always will bring forth 
the mutual ownership of large industrial undertak- 
ings and genuine profit-sharing for millions of people. 

Unfortunately, the American people, having permit- 
ted the entire supply of their country's oil, beef, sugar, 
coffee, etc., to become the private property of a few 
individuals, did not cover themselves with glory. 
They have given away their birthright for a pitiful 
"mess of potage." 

As the result of such a give-away policy, the state 
of affairs in the industrial world of the present day 
is unnatural: a few have too much, while the ma- 
jority have not enough. The precepts of nature's law 
of limitation have been disregarded, and even reversed : 
UNITS HAVE BECOME MORE IMPORTANT 
THAN THE WHOLE. Consequently the harmony 
of the whole has been turned into a huge discord, 
which it is our misfortune to witness to-day. 

Equitable distribution of wealth has become a dead 
letter; equal rights to all, special privileges to none, — 
a mockery; and equality of opportunity, — an insult to 
the intelligence of the American people! 



[THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 149 

CHAPTER VII 

Limited Private Ownership — the Remedy 

*'The supreme object to be attained is that 
the people of the country be brought back 
into the ownership of the corporate property 
of the country. . . . An ownership so indi- 
vidualized that it can be said at last that all 
the property of the country belongs to the 
people." — Judge P. S. Grosscup, in "Who 
Shall Own America." 

While we all agree upon the desirability of the 
equitable distribution of wealth, most of us are only 
wistfully longing for it, doing nothing toward its 
achievement; others believe the equitable distribution 
to be an unattainable myth, and still others, — tariff re- 
formers, single-taxers, socialists, cooperationists, and 
those who believe in profit-sharing, — are striving for 
its attainment by means which appeal to them as most 
applicable. The ranks of the latter have been aug- 
mented of late by those who believe, with the author, 
that the widespread adoption of the principle of limited 
ownership of private property will make profit-sharing 
and equitable distribution a fact and will force pov- 
erty — that dread offspring of the inequitable distribu- 
tion of wealth, — to disappear from the face of the 
earth. 



ISO KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

LIMITED OWNERSHIP IN SAVINGS BANKS 

Limited private ownership of business enterprises, 
with Hmited shareholding as its expression, is not a 
fancy; it is a reality which is met every day. 

Furthermore, it is not in its experimental stage, 
either. It has been found in every respect satisfactory 
after a thorough trial of many years. 

The American savings banks are fair exponents of 
the benefits of the principle of limited ownership ap- 
plied to business. No one depositor may deposit more 
than the maximum of $3,000. The profits of these 
banks belong to all depositors and are distributed 
among them in proportion to their deposits at stated 
periods. 

Being mutual and not private institutions, these 
banks are under very strict supervision. While private 
banks may be drawn into wild-cat schemes and finan- 
cial jugglery, savings banks stand aloof, dignified and 
above suspicion. Their owners, the people, have en- 
joined the apostles of high finance to keep their hands 
off the savings of the people. This explains the fact 
of their healthy growth and unquestionable popularity. 

There are seventeen hundred savings banks in this 
country, with the combined assets reaching the vast 
figure of four billion dollars. Almost ten million de- 
posits are made yearly, and the profits, amounting to 
a hundred and fifty millions a year, are distributed 
among millions of depositors. 

It is a genuine equitable distribution of profits ! 



JHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 151 

LIMITED OWNERSHIP IN BUILDING AND 
LOAN ASSOCIATIONS 

Another example of the business enterprises of the 
people, conducted by the people and for the people, 
and on a limited ownership plan, is presented by the 
thoroughly American building and loan associations. 

This branch of the industrial activities of the people 
has also completely escaped being subjugated by in- 
dustrial giants. Many attempts have been made by 
some clever financiers to assume the guise of these 
mutual associations, to carry off their patronage and 
pocket the profits. But the people would not be de- 
ceived. They have faithfully stood by their own well- 
tried institutions, flatly refused to give the designing 
financiers the coveted patronage, and by so doing they 
have driven the suave impostors out of business. 

The organization and business transactions of these 
associations are well known. A group of persons 
jointly own in them a small capital which is either 
lent or borrowed, as occasion may arise, but always 
between members only, "mutually," and chiefly for 
the purpose of home-building. Every member de- 
rives equal benefits and draws, in proportion to his 
or her shareholding, the entire profits from each and 
every transaction of the association. 

Limited ownership is embodied in their invariable 
rule forbidding anyone to hold more than twenty-five 
shares valued at $5,000. This limit is occasionally 
raised to $10,000. 



152 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

The independence and success of the building and 
loan associations is largely attributable to their ad- 
herence to the principles of mutuality and limited 
ownership. There is no room for doubt that, were 
their shareholding unlimited, they would have long 
ago become a huge monopoly, absorbed by some clever 
captain of industry, for his own "personal" benefit and 
profit. But, ensconced behind the sound principle of 
mutuality, these associations remain independent pub- 
lic property. 

In every town and village, in fact all over the land, 
thousands upon thousands of homes of persons in 
moderate circumstances are mutely yet eloquently 
testifying to the benefits accrued to the people 
through the ministry of these associations. It is safe 
to assume that the majority of these homes would 
have never been built but for the valuable help ren- 
dered by these fair exponents of the principle of lim- 
ited ownership. 

There are in the United States, at the present time, 
over 6,000 purely mutual building and loan associ- 
ations, whose membership has reached 2,300,000. 
During the past year the members have borrowed 
on mortgages upward of $283,000,000, and on their 
passbooks, as temporary loans, $20,000,000. The 
weekly dues and deposits of members amount to over 
$280,000,000, and the total assets of all associations 
combined to $1,000,000,000. 

These data are taken from the latest available re- 
port of the United States League of the Local Build- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 153 

ing and Loan Associations. The league has been 
formed for the purpose of caring for interests com- 
mon to all local associations, and proved particularly 
useful in warding off the attempts of financial cap- 
tains of industries to monopolize the business of these 
associations. 

Perhaps the day is not far distant when the Ameri- 
can people will own and manage all their industries 
in the same way as they do in these associations, and 
will have central leagues to look after the common 
interests of local groups! 

MUTUAL BENEFIT ORGANIZATIONS 

American fraternal organizations, though not in a 
class of profit-bringing enterprises, are admirable il- 
lustrations of the popularity among Americans of the 
principle of independent mutuality and limited share- 
holding. They demonstrate the fact that the Ameri- 
can people are alive to the possibilities of conducting 
business themselves, without necessarily being bossed 
by some financial genius, or by a paternal socialistic 
government, for that matter. 

The business part of the activities of these associa- 
tions is not inconsiderable. During the past year their 
active membership has reached, in America, 11,720,215. 
Their foremost representative, the Royal Arcanum, 
has met the contingencies of many deaths and paid 
over $127,500,000 to the beneficiaries of deceased mem- 
bers. Various other orders and societies have done 



154 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

splendid work as regards mutual relief in time of 
need, and all of them may be considered as efficient 
training schools for the principle of mutuality, with 
the people as scholars, well-nigh graduated after many 
years of practical work. 

GIANT COMPANIES ON BASIS OF LIMITED 
SHAREHOLDING 

It may be said that the examples quoted refer only 
to business enterprises conducted on a small scale, 
and that the basis of limited shareholding cannot be 
applied with success to enterprises on a large scale. 
We shall presently see that several gigantic enter- 
prises, handling billions of the people's money, are 
conducted on the same principle and with great suc- 
cess. The enterprises in question are the giant mu- 
tual insurance companies. For the purposes of illus- 
trating them we shall take a look at the status and 
workings of the foremost among them. 

As far back as in 1841 an American mutual insur- 
ance company was organized, and assumed the name 
of Nylic. The present name of the company, for 
obvious reasons, need not be disclosed; suffice it to 
say that the company does business under the char- 
ter granted to it by the State of New York, and all 
the figures quoted herein are taken from the latest 
report of the Superintendent of Insurance of that 
State. 

The Nylic has adopted, as its principle, the mutual- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 155 

ity of a family, as its emblem the picture of an eagle 
feeding its young, and as its business creed the motto, 
"mutual benefits to all, partiality to none," the motto 
of all really mutual organizations. The Nylic has 
steadfastly adhered to these honorable principles for 
over 70 years, and is faithful to them to this day. 

The founders of the Nylic wisely decided to es- 
tablish a limit to the shareholding of the company 
to $100,000. That is, no one person may become a 
member holding a policy on his life for an amount 
larger than $100,000. A $300,000 policy may be issued 
in exceptional cases, and, if a larger amount of insur- 
ance is granted to an individual, the risk must be re- 
insured in other companies for the excess of the com- 
pany's maximum limit. Thus the company's liability 
does not exceed the prescribed limit in any individual 
case. To this principle of limitation the company un- 
doubtedly owes its complete independence, popular- 
ity and great success. 

As a result of the limitation of shareholding, the 
Nylic is the absolute property of over one million 
small depositors, who are, in proportion to the amount 
of their deposits, its owners, rulers and chief bene- 
ficiaries. In that capacity they receive all the benefits 
and all the profits which are derived from the com- 
pany's "mutual" business. 

Is it not an ideal method of ownership for our busi- 
ness enterprises conducted on a large scale? 



156 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



LARGE ENTERPRISES WITHOUT AID OF 
MILLIONAIRE SHAREHOLDERS 

Without the aid of any millionaire shareholder the 
Nylic has become one of the greatest fiduciary insti- 
tutions of the world. Its example has conclusively 
refuted the contention that we stand in urgent need 
of millionaires and their "private" fortunes for the 
successful conduct of our large enterprises. 

In its assets the Nylic has immense wealth, con- 
sisting mostly of real estate, government and railroad 
bonds, and other safe securities, to the total amount 
of $705,000,000! This enormous wealth is restrained 
from outside interference by rigid regulations, and in 
consequence of such prudent policy is securely re- 
posing in the company's safety vaults, while the cus- 
todians may be interpreted as saying to the anxious 
devotees of high finance: "Hands off, please. This 
is the property of the American people." 

The Nylic has all over the world numerous branches 
and offices. Its magnificent twelve stories' high home 
office, in the city of New York, is built throughout of 
white marble, mahogany and oak, and is valued at 
five millions of dollars. As many as ten thousand 
persons are daily visiting this office of the Nylic on 
business. For their accommodation, and for the bene- 
fit of over one thousand employees, the building con- 
tains 19 elevators, 470 telephones, 2,900 feet of pneu- 
matic tubing, an electric plant, a large printing office 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 157 

(occupying four floors), and its own post-office, which 
handles daily over nine thousand parcels of mail. This 
beehive of industry is a substantial monument to the 
popularity of the Nylic and to the absolute soundness 
and practicability of the principles of mutuality and 
limited shareholding, upon which it has been reared. 

The actual rulers of the company are the twenty- 
four elective trustees, — men of the highest standing 
in the community, who are managing the affairs of 
the compan}'' through their committees and sub-com- 
mittees, which hold, on the average, eight hundred 
meetings a year. The trustees draw no salaries, re- 
ceiving only a nominal compensation for actual at- 
tendance at the meetings. 

The president of the company is elected by the 
trustees to serve one year only, at a salary of $50,000. 
Other executive officers, elected also for one year only, 
are receiving for their services ample but not too- 
excessive remunerations of from ten to thirty-five 
thousand dollars per annum. 

It is noteworthy that, although the officers have no 
other inducements aside from their salaries, the Nylic 
has grown great exclusively owing to their untiring 
efforts in its behalf. It has had a succession of emi- 
nently capable, upright and efficient presidents and 
their associates who have rendered highly creditable 
services. 

This fact of having in our midst thoroughly effi- 
cient captains of industry, whose ambition is suffi- 
ciently spurred and energy amply remunerated by a 



158 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

comparatively small compensation, — demonstrates be- 
yond doubt the advisability of dispensing with the 
services of the extra-expensive captains of other 
Ameridan industries. The Nylic has conclusively 
proved that we can easily secure the services of men 
as capable as Carnegies and Rockefellers, at $25,000 
or $50,000, instead of $25,000,000 or $50,000,000 per an- 
num. A comparison in favor of the Nylic's method, 
proving that its capable managers are ONE THOU- 
SAND TIMES less expensive than the aforesaid gen- 
tlemen, who imagine themselves, very likely sincerely, 
as indispensable captains of American industries. 
Generals and admirals we need and will always have; 
kings and barons we do not need, and shall soon dis- 
pense with their services. True to its traditions, the 
American nation, having rejected a political kingdom, 
will not tolerate much longer an industrial kingdom. 
Until the Nylic opened our eyes we had no clear 
understanding of the case, and, consequently, bowed 
to the apparent necessity of calling upon the services 
of the unreasonably expensive Fricks, Schwabs, and 
others; now, however, since all mutual and limited- 
ownership corporations, similar to the Nylic, have 
proved the practicability and great economy in en- 
gaging more reasonable managers for our industries, 
it would have been indeed unwise not to profit by 
their experience. 



JHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 159 



NYLIC VERSUS STANDARD OIL 

It is interesting to match the champion of limited 
mutual ownership against the champion of monopo- 
lies and trusts. 

The Nylic is equaled by the Standard Oil in the 
magnitude of its transactions. But there is an im- 
mense difference between them as regards the bene- 
fits derived from them by the American people. One 
is the mutual property of a million persons ; the other 
the private property of an insignificant cluster of im- 
mensely rich individuals. 

A million owners of the Nylic are receiving yearly 
upward of fifty millions of dollars in benefits and 
profits; the millionaire owners of the Standard Oil, 
scarcely a thousand in number, are distributing "be- 
tween themselves" an equally large amount of profits 
derived from this nation's oil industry. 

On one side a million families are benefited by shar- 
ing the profits of part of an insurance industry of the 
nation; on the other, an infinitesimal portion of the 
population, possessing already fabulous fortunes, are 
drawing for their own exclusive benefit the total 
profits from the entire oil industry of the country. 

At least five million persons are benefited by the 
Nylic; five thousand only, — if that many, — are the 
direct profit-gatherers of the Standard Oil. Here we 
meet again with a ratio of ONE THOUSAND TO 
ONE in favor of the Nylic. In other words, the Nylic 



i6o KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

is one thousand times more beneficial for the Amer- 
ican people than the Standard Oil. 

In this comparison the most prominent feature only 
was taken into consideration, — the pecuniary profits. 
Had we compared in detail the clean business meth- 
ods of the Nylic with the unsavory tactics of the Stan- 
dard Oil, — its clandestine meetings, railroad rebating, 
corruption of officials, spying upon and mercilessly 
crushing competitors, arbitrary ''fixing" of the prices, 
etc., — we should then have been compelled to admit 
that the Nylic is MANY THOUSAND TIMES more 
acceptable than the Standard Oil. 

More than a score of corporations engaged in the 
same line of business as the Nylic, and managing 
their affairs upon the same principles of mutuality and 
limited shareholders, are highly beneficial for more 
than twenty-five millions of people all over the world. 
The combined assets of these twenty-seven American 
mutual insurance companies have passed the enormous 
sum of three billions of dollars! 

Limited individual shareholding always results in 
widespread public profit-sharing; while unlimited in- 
dividual shareholding is bound to result in the estab- 
lishment of a private monopoly and in the exclusion 
of the public from the profit-sharing. 

Thus enterprises on a large scale may be, — as some 
of them are at the present time, — successfully con- 
ducted on a mutual and limited shareholding basis. 
Consequently there is no business, however large and 
important, which the American people could not man- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE i6i 

age themselves, for their own benefit and profit. 
There is no sound reason why they should not adhere 
to these wholesome principles, and thereby put a stop 
to the utterly objectionable unlimited shareholding 
and its baneful offspring, — private monopoly and 
trusts. 



LIMITED OWNERSHIP VS. PRIVATE 
MONOPOLY 

The following facts observed in the sphere of limited 
shareholding in the corporations quoted above illus- 
trate a few of the chief advantages to be derived by 
the people at large from this form of ownership as 
compared with the corresponding disadvantages from 
the form of unlimited shareholding and resulting pri- 
vate monopoly prevalent at the present time. 

Limited Ownership Private Monopoly 

All industries are the All industries are the 

mutual property of mil- private property of a few 

lions of people. families. 

All profits belong to All profits belong to a 

millions of families. few millionaire families. 

Millionaires in business Millionaires in business 

are unknown. own all the important in- 
dustries of the nation. 

Captains of industry can Captains of industry 

be obtained for $50,000 are drawing up to $50,- 

per annum. 000,000 per annum. 



l62 



KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



Limited Ownership 

The prices of goods are 
the lowest for the con- 
sumer, consistent with a 
reasonable profit for the 
owners. 

Expensive labor-saving 
machines and their prod- 
ucts belong to millions. 



Many thousands are em- 
ployed at comfortable 
wages, working seven 
hours a day, on the aver- 
age. 

Stock-watering is un- 
known. 



Equal rights to all, spe- 
cial privileges to none. 

Equitable distribution of 
wealth; all have "enough." 



Equality of opportuni- 
ty; anyone may rise to the 
highest position. 

La lustries of the peo- 
ple, by the people, and for 
the people. 



Private Monopoly 

The prices of goods are 
"fixed" for both the far- 
mer-producer and the pub- 
lic-consumer, yielding an 
"unreasonable" profit for 
the millionaire owners. 

Expensive labor-saving 
machines are faithfully 
working for the exclusive 
benefit of their owners, 
the millionaires in business. 

Many thousands, pref- 
erably illiterate foreign- 
ers, are employed at ex- 
istence wages of $9 a 
week, working ten hours 
a day, on the average. 

Stock- watering is a 
common occurrence, the 
people being defrauded of 
billions of dollars. 

Delusive rights to all, 
special privileges to the 
Kings of Wealth. 

Inequitable distribution 
of wealth : a few have 
"too much," many have 
"too little." 

Inequality of opportun- 
ity; no one may hope to 
ever equal the hereditary 
millionaire monopolist. 

Industries of the people, 
by the people and for the 
Kings of Wealth. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 1163 



LIMITED OWNERSHIP THE REMEDY 

The principle of Limited Ownership antagonizes 
no accepted conception of private property, no more 
than did the Homestead Act. It merely proposes that 
the people own and manage all their industries in 
the same way as they own and manage their sav- 
ings banks, building and loan associations, and mu- 
tual insurance companies. It recommends sharehold- 
ing limited to a certain reasonable figure, and is op- 
posed solely to unlimited shareholding, the forerunner 
of private monopoly. It defends and upholds private 
property, moderated and limited; it attacks and will 
eventually abolish the anomalous unlimited property 
and its offspring, private monopoly. 

The history of every nation on earth unmistakably 
corroborates the truthfulness of the fact that, as soon 
as the wealth of a nation becomes concentrated into 
the possession of a few, the impoverishment of the 
people and the ruin of that nation follow. Such was 
the destiny of ancient Egypt, Rome, China, India, 
Poland, Russia, Turkey, and all of them, in fact. Some 
of the nations had 'their revolutionary upheavals, 
which acted as a stay to decay, but not one nation 
is to-day in a thoroughly healthy condition. Our 
own country is no exception to the rule. 

The economic disease, to which all nations com- 
monly succumb, is congestion of wealth. Like con- 
gestion of blood in a human body, this disease is oc- 



i64 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

casioned by an unnatural accumulation of the life- 
giving fluid in one part of the social body, at the ex- 
pense and exclusion of all other parts. All parts of 
the social body, except the one which is congested, 
are suffering from a lack of proper nourishment, are 
gradually being reduced in vitality and will degener- 
ate and die. 

If the diagnosis of this social disease is correct, 
then what is the task of the physician? Should not 
his very first effort be to devise and apply the proper 
means for sending that precious life blood from the 
congested part toward the parts which suffer from 
the lack of it? The proposed Law of Limited Owner- 
ship will fulfil this mission. It is devised to act di- 
rectly upon the root of the disease. It is not a half- 
hearted subterfuge like the income tax, inheritance 
tax, etc. It is, in its nature, a direct and prohibitory 
law. It will effectually cure the congestion by a 
direct prohibition of further ''private" accumulations 
of wealth and by establishing a reasonable limit to 
such accumulations, so as to give the life-blood of the 
nation a chance to reach all parts of the social body, 
and not limit it to only the few, specially privileged 
persons and families. 

As was shown in the preceding chapter, the proper 
time for the enactment of the Industrial Homestead 
Act embraced the period when the industries began 
their development. Our statesmen have missed their 
opportunity, and allowed unlimited ownership and 
private monopoly to congest the life-blood of the 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 165 

nation, its wealth, to an alarming degree. From such 
lack of foresight the wealth of the American Na- 
tion is now congested to such an extent that only a 
radical measure can restore its circulation to a natu- 
ral condition. Limited Ownership is the measure. 

The proposed law of Limited Ownership prohibits 
an unreasonable unlimited accumulation of private 
wealth, but it does not recommend any confiscation. 
Let those who own now any amount of wealth con- 
tinue in the enjoyment of it during their natural life, 
but not after their death. This republic cannot af- 
ford to foster an hereditary plutocracy. The law of 
Limited Ownership will take care that none inherit 
more than the prescribed limit. It will discontinue 
forever the unjust, unnatural, and extremely harmful 
hereditary millionairism. Thus, in the course of a sin- 
gle generation, the obnoxious phenomenon, the mil- 
lionaire in business, will become a thing of the past; 
and he will take with him into oblivion his pet cre- 
ations. Private Monopoly and Private Trusts. 

BALLOT IS THE ONLY WEAPON WE NEED 

We, the people of this free and independent repub- 
lic, may well be ashamed for allowing things to exist 
which we know are wrong, and may be remedied. 

Oh, why and for what are we waiting. 
While our brothers droop and die, 
And on every breeze of the heavens 
A wasted life goes by? 

— William Morris. 



i66 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

The trouble is we are exercising our sovereignty by 
solemnly casting our votes for Smith or Brown, both 
equally crooked and scheming politicians, looking 
hungrily for a "job," and fully prepared to make hay 
while the sun shines (for them). 

In this unworthy manner we are using our right to 
govern ourselves and are electing, year after year, a 
swarm of grafters, bribe-takers, and so-much-per 
head officials and statesmen who are ready and anx- 
ious to do service for the highest bidder. 

The ballot is a mighty weapon. To turn it to such 
an ignominious use is worse than throwing it away. 
It means sullying it and bringing into disrepute. It 
also means displaying a woeful ignorance as to the 
obvious causes of the ills that are besetting our social 
life; for on all sides monopolists of every description 
are looting the people at will, sapping their very life- 
blood, while the general economic condition of the 
country grows more appalling every day. 

Yet, if used intelligently, the ballot is the only 
weapon we need. With its help we can easily and 
speedily establish a limited individual ownership of 
private property, which would render us free once 
more; free industrially as well as politically; free 
from life-long dependence upon the mercies of our 
present industrial masters; free from the compulsion 
of paying them a tribute in arbitrarily ''fixed" high 
prices, to pay which is far more humiliating than 
would have been the direct payment of a tribute to 
any foreign potentate. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 167 

When we go again to the polling places shall it be 
,the same old story of voting for Smith or Brown, 
or shall we cast our votes for one who will pledge 
himself to work for a measure that will bring us Lim- 
ited Ownership, which, as Dr. John Clark Ridpath 
said, "will rob private property of its power to curse 
and promote its power to bless"? 

Shall we continue the game of "blind man's buff" 
against "bad" trusts, and strive to "control" what 
cannot be controlled? Or shall we penetrate to the 
root of the evil, — unlimited ownership fraught with 
infinite evil, — and substitute for it just and equitable 
limited ownership? Shall we continue to allow our- 
selves to be fleeced by the all-grasping monopolists, 
or shall we brush them aside from the path of progress 
and civilization which they obstruct? Which shall 
it be? 

Let us vote for no CANDIDATE FOR CON- 
GRESS unless he pledges himself to the enactment of 
the LAW OF LIMITED PRIVATE OWNERSHIP! 

We certainly can never expect to emerge from in- 
dustrial thraldom unless we adopt the only effective 
political-economic measure, Limited Ownership, 
which is bound to lead us to an equitable distribution 
of wealth and free us forever from the iniquitous 
Private Monopolists. 



l68 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 



CHAPTER Vin 

Arguments Against and for Limited Private 
Ownership 

While lecturing and debating upon the subject the 
writer met with objections and arguments which de- 
serve attention, and may as well be answered here. 

"HOW WOULD LAW OF LIMITED OWNER- 
SHIP BENEFIT MEr 

This was the foremost objection, and "ME'* was 
invariably spelled with capital letters. The objector 
manifestly could not rise above the common failing 
of many mortals, who place themselves in the very 
center of all creation. An abnormal sense of self- 
importance has obscured for him the otherwise self- 
evident truth that whatever benefits his community 
must eventually benefit him, as a unit of that com- 
munity. 

The proposed law is certainly not expected to en- 
dow any one with a ready-made fortune of $250,000, 
whether he earned it or not. It will merely limit the 
shareholding of any individual in any industry to that 
amount, giving thereby an equal opportunity to mil- 
lions of small investors to participate in the profits 
derived from the nation's industries. The objector, 
presumably not a millionaire, would obviously be 
benefited by such a limitation of individual sharehold- 



(THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 169 

ing, unless he is neither industrious nor enterprising. 
In the latter case the proposed law will not help him, 
for it is not designed to bestow fortunes on idlers; 
quite the reverse. It will create more equitable oppor- 
tunities for all, and discontinue the special privileges 
of the few. 



"A QUARTER-MILLION DOLLARS NOT 
ENOUGH" 

Perhaps it is not "enough," according to present 
standards. Yet would it not be enough for you, my 
reader, to draw about $15,000 a year as long as you 
live for no harder work than to thoroughly enjoy 
yourself? On the other hand, it would surely be 
quite "enough" for any community to have a number 
of its able workingmen labor exclusively for your 
benefit (as was shown in Chapter III), supporting 
you in exactly the same way as an idle pauper is sup- 
ported in a poorhouse. 

Unless our understanding of the nature of "profits" 
is at fault, a profit-bringing property of $250,000 
ought to be morally "enough," and more than enough, 
for any citizen worthy of the name, although it may 
not be "enough" for an Indian Rajah or a Chinese 
Mandarin. 

It should also be remembered that the law in ques- 
tion would limit only the private possessions of an 
individual, leaving untouched his privilege to draw 
any reasonable amount of remuneration for the actual 



170 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

services which he may be able to render to the com- 
munity. Thus, anyone who is not an idler would have 
an absolutely equal opportunity with anyone else to 
earn, in addition to his vmearned profits, a salary as 
high as that of the President of the United States, or 
even higher, should his services be of greater value to 
the community. Would it still be not "enough"? 

"PRINCIPLE OF LIMITATION IS UN- 
AMERICAN" 

Were the principle of limitation un-American, this 
free and independent republic would never have come 
into being by the application of that very principle 
to the curtailment of the unlimited power of George 
III and his Parliament over the "Colonies." Our po- 
litical freedom was won and is maintained by the ap- 
plication of the same principle of a well-defined limi- 
tation to the will of an individual, imposed upon him 
out of regard for the welfare of the majority of the 
people. Our industrial freedom can be won in no 
other way. 

The American Homestead Act is, in the industrial 
sphere, the most important law of limitation ever en- 
acted in this world. It is thoroughly American. By 
this act a strict limitation was decreed as to the 
amount of land which might be preempted by any 
one citizen. It is a pity indeed that this wholesome 
American principle was abandoned in a later indus- 
trial life, and was substituted by that time-worn mon- 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 171 

strosity, savoring of barbarism,— the principle of 
"grab-as-you-please." As soon as the democratic prin- 
ciple of limitation was lost sight of, the obnoxious 
flower of Private Monopoly blossomed forth; it grew 
rapidly to gigantic proportions, and is to-day blasting 
the life of this nation. 

As the main object of the principle of limited owner- 
ship is to discontinue hereditary millionairism, it is in 
strict keeping with the former American policy of our 
forefathers, who rejected entailment of estates, — a 
British principle of hereditary Ibrdism. 

The principle of Limitation is a principle of fair 
play, of a square deal ; both of which are undoubtedly 
American. 

"LIMITED OWNERSHIP WOULD STIFLE 
AMBITION AND CURB ENERGY" 

It certainly would, in a measure. But is a demo- 
cratic republic a proper place for fostering the am- 
bition of an individual to become a grab-it-all mon- 
ster? Or for encouraging his "energy" to build a 
despotically powerful monopoly, to crush all small 
dealers, "fix" the prices, and to arbitrarily tax the 
people? Let such ambition and such energy emi- 
grate to some other clime, to some autocratic em- 
pire. Here they should be both "stifled and curbed" 
by all the means within our power. 

On the other hand, a salary equal to that of the 
Chief Executive of the Nation, and the permission 



•172 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

to own a comfortable fortune which would yield a 
reasonable amount of absolutely unearned income, 
ought to be a sufficient incentive for the ability, am- 
bition and energy of anyone. 

A reward for enterprise and industry should not be 
perverted into a license to appropriate everything 
worth the taking. The cardinal principle of a demo- 
cratic republic, — "The greatest good for the greatest 
number," — is poorly served by such license. 

"MILLIONAIRES AND CAPITAL WOULD 
LEAVE THE COUNTRY'' 

Millionaires personally, as mere money bags, — such 
as W. W. A., the expatriated one, — are equally use- 
less, whether present or absent. But as regards their 
"capital," let us not forget that they cannot possibly 
take with them their business possessions, such as oil 
wells, coal mines, sugar refineries, railroads, etc. All 
these will remain where they are at present. But, in 
order to comply with the new law prescribing a limit 
of $250,000 for individual private property, they will 
have to, in course of time, acquire different owners. 
And, in such a case, each of these possessions would 
be owned by many thousands of small shareholders, 
instead of by a solitary millionaire, whether present or 
an absentee. 

The business property, — capital, — would simply 
change hands, to the evident advantage of the people, 
and that is all the "calamity" that would befall us 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 173 

should our millionaires and billionaires choose to emi- 
grate to foreign lands. 

"THE PEOPLE ARE NOT RICH ENOUGH TO 

PURCHASE PROPERTY OF 

MILLIONAIRES" 

If that be true, then may the Lord have mercy on 
us as a nation. Fortunately, the statement is not cor- 
rect. The American people are not rich individually, 
but, in the aggregate, they are rich enough to own 
enormous deposits in the savings banks, building and 
loan associations and insurance companies. In fact, 
had the original capital for national industrial enter- 
prises been raised by popular subscription, — as it 
should have been, — and not by a small clique of Wall 
Street financiers, the American people, and not a few 
millionaires, would have been the actual owners and 
beneficiaries of American industries. 

The people are rich enough to be defrauded of 
many millions of dollars through impudent stock- 
watering by unscrupulous financiers, by the "get-rich- 
quick" swindlers, and by numberless political grafters 
all over this land. 

They are rich enough to be taxed unmercifully by 
arbitrary prices on the necessities of life, "fixed" by 
the monopolists "to suit themselves," and by those 
brazen conspirators who would rather burn coffee 
than bring comfort to millions of homes by selling it 
at a reasonable price. 



174 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

They are rich enough, AS YET, to acquire and re- 
claim their industrial wealth, BEFORE IT IS TOO 
LATE! 



"ENTERPRISES OF MILLIONAIRES BENE- 
FITED THE PEOPLE" 

True, the American people owe a debt of gratitude 
to Commodore Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, Carnegie, and 
other industrial pioneers and up-builders. The coun- 
try should be proud of them. Unfortunately, all these 
gentlemen labored at the time when that iniquity, 
unlimited ownership, held its full sway. Conse- 
quently, instead of remaining revered leaders in their 
respective industries, they have become hated mo- 
nopolists. 

Let us imagine that the Limited Ownership Law 
had been already on our statute books at the time 
when all these industrial giants commenced their ca- 
reers. They would have achieved the same success, 
would have built the same great industries; but they 
would have done so for the benefit of millions of small 
shareholders; and, withal, they would have been per- 
fectly satisfied with their large salaries of, say, $ioo,- 
000 or more per annum. Then only would they have 
been considered as foremost citizens, esteemed and 
beloved by all, and not prosecuted, abhorred and 
looked upon as arch enemies of the people. 

Is it not plain that that absurdity, — unlimited pri- 
vate ownership,— DOES GOOD TO NO ONE? Is 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 175 

it not a pity that an injustice is being done to the 
men mentioned, everyone of them a genius in his line? 
Their millions have outweighed their sterling quali- 
ties and great services. Their limitless accumulations 
have brought on them the hate of the people, and 
turned those who might have been beloved leaders 
into contemptible price-fixers, selfish monopolists and 
enemies of the community. 

There is not a shadow of a doubt that LIMITED 
OWNERSHIP WILL BENEFIT EVERYONE 
AND HURT NO ONE. 



'^MILLIONAIRES ARE EMPLOYING THOU- 
SANDS OF PEOPLE" 

And so did the Egyptian Pharaohs, who gave em- 
ployment to many thousands of wretches by forcing 
them to rear up the stupendous pyramids; and so did 
the Feudal Barons in the Dark Ages; and so did the 
^'masters" ever employ the "servants"; Robinson Cru- 
soes, — Men Fridays ; for many thousands of years. It 
does not follow, however, that the free citizens of the 
American Republic should rest contented to remain 
forever in the class of "servants"; that they should 
relish the prospect of eternal servitude for the benefit 
of one or the other of the Industrial Kings. Let 
them, instead, make the wonderful labor-saving ma- 
chines their faithful servants. And so it certainly 
shall be some day, after the American people have 
succeeded in reclaiming, — with the help of the Law 



176 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

of Limited Ownership, — the proprietorship of those 
innumerable labor-savers which are to-day completely 
monopolized by a few. 

As regards the employment to be had, and the wages 
to be paid for it, — when the American people own 
and manage their industries on a limited shareholding 
plan they will require the assistance and cooperation 
of as many thousands as are now employed, and of 
many more; and it is safe to predict that the wages 
will be much higher than they are at present, while the 
hours of labor will be reduced to four, or perhaps three 
a day, because the labor-saving machines will become 
the property of the people and will be operated FOR 
THE PEOPLE. 

There is nothing Utopian in this: WHEN PRI- 
VATE MONOPOLY DEPARTS THE PEOPLE 
WILL COME INTO THEIR OWN. 

"LIMITED OWNERSHIP LAW WILL BE 
EVADED" 

It will be evaded for some time, but not for all time. 
When the evaders have realized that the people are 
in earnest they will speedily discontinue unprofitable 
evasions. But, even should they go on with evasions, 
is it not better to have the evaders understand that 
they are "law-breakers" than to honor them and con- 
sider them benefactors, as is our custom to-day? 

Evasions are possible only as long as public officers 
are corrupt. With prosperity, corruption will cease. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 177 

Because it is poverty that makes men corrupt. It is 
very shortsighted to assert that men are corrupt for 
v^ickedness' sake. The Great Founder of the Christian 
religion said: "Let him that is without sin cast the 
first stone." 

When the conditions in our social life shall have 
become gradually better, and poverty is on the de- 
crease, then a limited ownership law will be enforced 
by incorruptible officials. Meanwhile, we have no 
choice, but to try to achieve the desired results with 
such imperfect material as is in our possession. 

"THE LAW IS IMPRACTICABLE AND WILL 
BE INEFFECTIVE" 

There is no reason why it should be considered 
either impracticable or ineffective. Let us imagine 
that it has been passed and is recorded on our statute 
books. All those who own private property in excess 
of the prescribed limit of $250,000 have registered their 
possessions, and are aware that, should they subse- 
quently increase them, in defiance of the law, they 
would be punished. On the other hand if they remain 
satisfied with their possessions as registered, they will 
have the privilege of enjoying their wealth, no matter 
how large it may be (there appears no remedy for 
this) during their natural life, BUT NOT BEYOND 
IT. 

The Limited Ownership law will take care of the 
fabulous fortunes of present millionaires in such a 
way that they will be speedily disintegrated. They 



1178 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

will be divided into as many parts, as many times 
$100,000 is contained in them : because no one will be 
permitted to bequeath or give away more than $ioo,- 
000 to any one individual. For instance, a billionaire's 
heir will have the right to inherit just $100,000 of his 
father's property, and no more. The rest of the bil- 
lionaire's immense possessions will have to go to other 
relations and friends, whom he may have chosen as 
his beneficiaries and legatees; in default of such a 
provision, the entire billion dollar property, minus the 
shares of his legal heirs, each not to exceed $100,000, 
would revert to the people at large, that is, to the 
State. 

Thus, with the help of the proposed law of Limited 
Ownership our social and industrial life will present, 
in the course of a single generation, the following as- 
pect. No one will start in life with a larger fortune 
than $100,000 (this amount appears to be a reasonable 
expedient). Should he be ambitious and industrious, 
nothing will hinder him from taking an active part 
in the management of his business and draw as large 
a salary, for the actual services rendered, as his ser- 
vices may be worth. Suppose he proves to be another 
Edison or Rockefeller — surely no one would deny or 
grudge him a very large remuneration for his valuable 
services. He has actually earned it and is fully en- 
titled to the fruits of his toil, ingenuity and industry. 
Meanwhile, such anomalies as the modern IDLE 
MILLIONAIRES BY INHERITANCE will be made 
absolutely IMPOSSIBLE. 



THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 179 

Therefore, the law of Limited Ownership is not 
only eminently just, but both practicable and eflEec- 
tive. 



LIMITED OWNERSHIP ENDORSED BY 
PROMINENT MEN 

Dr. John Clark Ridpath says, in "Limitation as a 
Remedy" : "It is not property, moderated and limited, 
but only the lawless excess of it, and the want of it, 
that curses the world. It is the 'too much' and the 
'too little' that blasts the hopes of men. Is it not 
possible that the doctrine of limitation applied to prop- 
erty might rob it of its power to curse, and promote its 
power to bless? A large part of the distress of the 
modern world is attributable to the fact that there are 
established in the sphere of property rights no salu- 
tary and accepted principles of limitation. As the case 
now stands, a man may buy and hold in fee simple, 
under the law and constitution, . . . the whole Missis- 
sippi Valley. ... It is manifest that no man has a 
moral right to do this, or ever can have it: such a 
supposititious right is an absurdity per se. . . . A re- 
striction on land ownership is a necessity; the how 
much is another question. . , . The principle of un- 
limited ownership cannot be linger admitted, as a 
part of the rights of man, if civil and industrial liberty 
is to be maintained." 

The great philosopher, Aristotle, says: "In human 
society extremes of wealth and poverty are the main 



i8o KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

sources of evil. The first brings arrogance; the sec- 
ond, slavishness. Where a population is divided into 
two classes of very rich and very poor there can be no 
real state; for there can be no real friendship between 
the classes, and friendship is the essential principle of 
all association." 

The great economist, John Stuart Mill, says: ''The 
form of the association which, if mankind continue to 
improve, must be expected in the end to predominate 
is the association of the laborers themselves on terms 
of equality, collectively owning the capital with which 
they carry on their operations, and working under 
managers elected and removable by themselves.'* 
(Does not this definition describe perfectly the "mu- 
tual" associations, such as the building and loan asso- 
ciations, etc., which are based on the principle of 
limited shareholding?) 

A prominent financier, George W. Perkins, uncon- 
sciously endorses the Limited Ownership idea by say- 
ing: **The corporations of the future will serve the 
public as semi-public servants, with ownership wide- 
spread among the public. In broadly distributed own- 
ership among the public the profits are distributed 
among the people, while for the benefit of the business 
is retained that necessary factor which has done so 
much for American industry, — individual initiative." 

A millionaire manufacturer, Andrew Carnegie, also 
unconsciously endorses the same idea : "We may look 
forward with hope to the day when it shall be the 
rule for the workman to be partner with capital, both 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE i8i; 

owners of the shares and equally interested in the suc- 
cess of their joint efforts ; when a feeling of mutuality 
is created, which now is generally lacking." 

UNLIMITED WEALTH VS. UNLIMITED 
POVERTY 

It has been already pointed out above that American 
millionaires' possessions equal the total combined 
wealth of twenty-five States of the Union. Govern- 
ment Statistician George K. Holmes states in the 
"Political Science Quarterly" that our millionaires 
"own seventy-three per cent, of the total wealth of the 
country." 

Our country is blessed with a great many kings and 
barons: a cattle king, an oil king, coal barons, coffee 
barons, and many others. When a certain railroad 
king died he left to his heir, a hopeful youth, the snug 
fortune of $100,000,000. A similar fortune is the right- 
ful property of a McLean heir, age three years, who 
recently left Newport "in a special car, under guard of 
special detectives, and with a retinue of a small army 
of nurses." Young Vincent Astor is also the rightful 
owner of another $100,000,000 of wealth. When the 
oil king leaves this world his heir will inherit some- 
where between $500,000,000 and a billion. These are a 
few of the prominent representatives of unlimited mil- 
lionairism-by-inheritance. 

The following poetical description caught the 
yrriter's fancy: "For many miles in every direction, 



i82 KINGS OF WEALTH VS, 

as far as the eye could see, lay hundreds of thousands 
of acres of the Cattle King. In front of him, behind 
him, on either side, everywhere, every inch of soil, 
every bush and tree, belong to the Cattle King. The 
very air appeared to belong to him, the wind seemed 
to whisper his name to the trees, while the little brooks, 
as they babbled over the stones, murmured sweetly, 
'Cattle King, Cattle King'; and the birds flying over 
his fields sang the same song of glorification to the 
Cattle King." 

*'Here, where dogs refuse to sleep," says Charles 
Dickens in "American Notes," "men, women and chil- 
dren come to seek refuge. Nowhere on the terrestrial 
globe are human beings placed in such miserable con- 
dition, as regards ventilation, light and odors arising 
from rear courts, as are those unfortunate beings who 
pass their wretched lives downtown in the city of 
New York." 

"Remember," says Cleveland Moffett, in "Shameful 
Misuse of Wealth," "the vast army of toilers enslaved 
in our factories and mines ; men, women and children, 
— millions of them, — giving the strength of their 
bodies and the hope of their souls, that a few thousand 
rich men may draw handsome dividends on invest- 
ments, dividends, which they have done nothing to 
cam, and which it bores them to spend." 

Says Walter Scott, in the person of Gurth ("Ivan- 
hoe") : "Little is left to us but the air we breathe, and 
that appears to have been reserved with much hesita- 
tion, soMy for the purpose of enabling us to endure 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 183 

the tasks they lay upon our shoulders. The finest and 
the fattest is for their board; the loveliest is for their 
couch ; the best and bravest supply them with soldiers 
and whiten distant lands with their bones." 

The following appeal from the pen of Charles Dick- 
ens is pathetic: "Give us, in mercy, better homes, 
when we are a-lying in our cradles ; give us better food 
when we are a-working for our lives; give us kinder 
laws to bring us back when we are a-going wrong." 

Such is the pitiful cry of millions of the **Miserables" 
of the twentieth century. 



MILLIONAIRES WIELD UNLIMITED POWER 
OF REAL SOVEREIGNS 

"The welfare of the people depends upon the whims 
or personal interests of a few men," said Senator Car- 
ter of Montana in one of his eloquent speeches. "We 
are told that six or seven men, by reason of their con- 
trol of the railroads, have in their power to make or 
unmake a community, to make or unmake a nation. 
The life or death of this country is in their hands." It 
is an awful power for a free people to delegate to in- 
dividuals ! 

Says Senator Chauncey M. Depew : "There are fifty 
men in the city of New York who can in twenty-four 
hours stop every wheel on all railroads, close every 
door of all our factories, lock every switch on every 
telegraph line, and shut down every coal mine in the 
(United States. They can do so because they control 



i84 KINGS OF WEALTH VS. 

the money, industries and commerce of the United 
States." This is one of the most powerful arguments 
in favor of the speedy enactment of the Law of Limited 
Ownership. 

A certain American millionaire is said to have once 
exclaimed : "I can buy the whole d d outfit/' mean- 
ing the Legislature, Executive and the Courts of Jus- 
tice. It was only a paraphrase of a well-known out- 
burst of Commodore Vanderbilt: "The public be 
damned !" 

Jay Gould, the author of Black Friday, on which' 
ciay many began business in the morning as rich men 
and went home in the afternoon, ruined beggars, is 
said to have remarked more than once: "I am rich 
enough to hire one-half of the people to shoot the other 
half." 

Yet, many years ago, Jean Jacques Rousseau pointed 
out that "Real prosperity can exist only where no 
citizen is so rich as to be able to buy others, and no 
one so poor that he is compelled to sell himself." And, 
according to Daniel Webster: "Liberty cannot long 
endure in a country where the tendency is to concen- 
trate wealth in the hands of a few." 

THE FINAL APPEAL 

Now that my work is finished, I take this oppor- 
tunity of appealing to my countrymen to give the sub- 
ject of this treatise their earnest and unbiased con- 
sideration, and, should they find my reasoning correct, 



iTHE AMERICAN PEOPLE 185 

let them not hesitate to adopt the proposed measure, 
however radical it may appear. Grave diseases re- 
quire powerful remedies. 

After many years of study of the great social prob- 
lem the writer is convinced that a direct and pro- 
hibitory law, limiting private ownership to any reason- 
able amount, is THE ONLY REMEDY for the cure 
of the dangerous, if not mortal, diseases of Congestion 
of Wealth and Unemployment. 

Oh, that these lines, written with no malice toward 
rich or poor, but with all sincerity and good-will to 
mankind, may perform the mission of another Paul 
Revere, dashing from village to village and awaken- 
ing the people with the call to arms: "Arouse, ye 
American freemen ! Plutocratic monopoly is upon us, 
despoiling us of our very lives !" 

Let us vote for no CANDIDATE FOR CONGRESS 

unless he pledges himself to the enactment of the 
LAW OF LIMITED PRIVATE OWNERSHIP. 

EDWARD N. OLLY. 

Hasbrouck Heights, N. J., Dec. i, 1913. 



DEC 13 1913 



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